Balancing in Pathfinder

[Minwaabi]

How well balanced are the different classes? I have noticed some significant differences from DnD 3.5 which make some classes a bit more powered than their 3.5 counterparts. Do the tiers still apply or does this just change some of the tiers around? Doesn't it even balance things out that much?

[BWR]

Clerics, druids and wizards still dominate.
The lesser classes have generally been given a few more powers that make them more fun, if not necessarily the equals of the Big Three.

[Spiryt]

Well, depends on what we mean by "balance".

Casters got upped a bit, just like everyone else, and in general nothing was really done to close the gap. So no real balancing on larger scale.

Other than that, a lot of classes got way funnier to play, with more choice and versatility, so definite plus here.

[NikitaDarkstar]

I would say that the balance issues are still there, but all classes have more options now (except the druid. Nothing really changed about the druid), and overall you have more incentive to go 20 straight levels in one class. But is it balanced? Not really, do you have less dead levels, more things the class "should have" by default, and more options than "I stab it/hit it" if you're a melee type? Certainly.

And the weaker classes did get a bit of a buff, for example the PF rogue IS more powerful than the 3.5 rogue, but it's still weaker than a wizard of any variety.

Still, I do like what PF did with the classes myself, I really do.

[Almaseti]

Personally, I think it made a little more balance within roles - Paladin and Monk are closer in power to Barbarian and Ranger, for example. But the overlying caster vs noncaster divide hasn't really changed. I don't really think you can change that all the much without alterations severe enough to make things unfamiliar to 3.5 players, but that's just me.

So better, but not balanced.

[neonchameleon]

Fighter and Paladin got boosted enough to push them into Tier 4 (Monk didn't). Bard probably dropped to Tier 4. And Druid dropped to Tier 2.

Of the new classes, Summoner is a very strong Tier 2 and possibly even Tier 1. Gunslinger's Tier 5. Magus, Inquisitor, and Alchemist are all (I think) Tier 3. Oracle's classic Tier 2. I haven't seen a Witch or a Cavalier in play - the Witch is either Tier 1 or Tier 2 depending on the spell list and the Cavalier is a Tier 4 who's largely pointless in dungeons.

So yeah, there were tweaks. And the balance is slightly improved but doesn't match the balance and diversity of a party containing one each of Warblade, Swordsage, Crusader, Bard, Dread Necromancer, Psychic Warrior, Wildshape Ranger, Beguiler, and Binder.

[Slipperychicken]

Maybe it's because the system is newer, but you generally have to work a lot harder to make truly balance-breaking effects.

The Summoner class in particular can be OP if you spend your feats and evolution points right.

[Prime32]

And the weaker classes did get a bit of a buff, for example the PF rogue IS more powerful than the 3.5 rogue, but it's still weaker than a wizard of any variety.Note that PF makes it harder to set up sneak attacks, prevents you from sneak attacking with alchemical items (meaning AC and DR are harder to deal with and you can't exploit energy vulnerabilities), and has no way to penetrate immunity to sneak attack (albeit it comes up less often than in 3.5e). Also with the condensed skills, being a skill monkey means less.

Likewise, while the fighter gets a few +1s meaning that the class itself is slightly stronger, its feats are heavily nerfed. E.g. you have to spend two feats on Improved Trip rather than one (not counting Combat Expertise), you can't use it without BAB +6, and making the extra attack counts as an attack of opportunity (which prevents you from making an AoO when they stand up, meaning no benefit unless you also have Combat Reflexes and a high Dex score).

[NikitaDarkstar]

Note that PF makes it harder to set up sneak attacks, prevents you from sneak attacking with alchemical items (meaning AC and DR are harder to deal with and you can't exploit energy vulnerabilities), and has no way to penetrate immunity to sneak attack (albeit it comes up less often than in 3.5e). Also with the condensed skills, being a skill monkey means less.
I've found that the sneak attacks aren't that much harder to set up than I was used to in 3.5. A tad bit, but not much, and the reduced amount of sneak attack immunities makes up for it a great deal. And since it's a system that is being published I wouldn't be surprised if additions happens in the future.

The alchemical items is a shame, but not devastating (most DM's I've played with houserules that it didn't work in 3.5 anyway, so I never got used to it, meaning I don't even realize it's gone half of the time). The condensed skills... I honestly don't think it makes the skill monkey less valuable. You still have more skills and skill points than basically everyone else, so you can still do more, it just means less micro-managing of skills that always went hand in hand to begin with.



Likewise, while the fighter gets a few +1s meaning that the class itself is slightly stronger, its feats are heavily nerfed. E.g. you have to spend two feats on Improved Trip rather than one (not counting Combat Expertise), you can't use it without BAB +6, and making the extra attack counts as an attack of opportunity (which prevents you from making an AoO when they stand up, meaning no benefit unless you also have Combat Reflexes and a high Dex score).

I almost never play Fighters, so I can't comment much on them, but I have noticed that many of their "improved-feats" aren't as good anymore, which sucks if you're going for a build that uses them a great deal. But that's about all I can say, my Fighter experience extends to 1 3.5 and 1 PF fighter in about 10 years, so I'm hardly an expert on the class (I'm a scoundrel, not a warrior!).

[turkishproverb]

Pathfinder made full casters stronger and everyone else weaker. Yes, even the Paladin (SEE: even minor infractions make you fall now, as opposed to "grossly violates").

So yea....Pathfinder is only good if you want more "WIZARDZ AND NUFFING ELS" and also a somewhat grimmdark assumed setting.

[navar100]

Here we go again. :smallsigh:

If you worship the Tier System, Pathfinder will not break your faith. Pathfinder is 3E. They made their choices in upgrading warriors, downgrading spells, and tweaking everything else. Some people like the changes. Some people don't. However, if you don't do anything without consulting the Tier Bible then whatever your thoughts on 3E applies to Pathfinder.

The 3E system is what it is. Details of mechanics can be changed here and there as Pathfinder has done, but it's not going to miraculously change its fundamentals of being. You either like it or don't. If you don't like it, to "fix" it would require getting rid of it and creating a new system from scratch. They did that with 4E. They're trying again with 5E.

As for my personal opinion of the matter, I find Pathfinder terrific. As someone who doesn't categorize everything into the Tier System for evaluation, I can enjoy the game for its own sake. When Pathfinder first came out minute details of changes bothered me, but after playing the game for awhile now I've learned to like those changes or got over it depending on the change. I was far more approving of the changes as a whole, especially the upgrading of the warrior classes and skill system.

[VeisuItaTyhjyys]

Clerics, druids and wizards still dominate.
The lesser classes have generally been given a few more powers that make them more fun, if not necessarily the equals of the Big Three.

Well, Half-elf sorcerers are kinda just better wizards, now, though. The ability to cast any spell on the sorcerer/wizard list spontaneously at the expense of one extra spell slot probably does wonders for getting over a childhood spent as an abused outcast, though. Good for you, half-elves. Don't let the man keep you down.


And the weaker classes did get a bit of a buff, for example the PF rogue IS more powerful than the 3.5 rogue, but it's still weaker than a wizard of any variety.

I'm of the opinion that the rogue actually took a hit in Pathfinder, in a lot of ways. In general, the hits mundanes took may be more subtle than the boosts they got, but a lot of times they can be more than crippling enough to make up for it.

In particular, I think consolidating the skills and trivializing cross-classing took away a lot of the rogue's niche (although it made that niche easier for the rogue to fill), the cuts to attacks of opportunity hurt, and the increase in monsters that can take precision damage is offset by the increased difficulty of setting up that precision damage.

[Felhammer]

Most of the weaker classes got more powerful while the strongest classes got a bit of a nerf (the Druid more so than the others).

It's still 3E, just with different icing.

It's not really better or worse, it's just different.

[Twilight Jack]

Really, it comes down to your playgroup.

If you and the folks with whom you play are heavy optimization types who squeeze maximum utility out of every aspect of the rules, then none of Pathfinder's changes alter the basic mathematics of the 3.x chassis. The system'll sit up and beg for you in all the same basic ways. Full casters still dominate everything at every level of play, although the druid isn't quite at the top of the heap anymore.

If you and your friends are more relaxed with regards to optimization, then a lot of the grosser imbalances between the classes have become a lot more manageable. Mundane classes have more options and more interesting mechanics. A bunch of the really breakable spells and feats have been toned down in subtle ways, and a few previously non-viable concepts have gotten some love that makes them worth a second look.

Wealth by Level and the 3.x Magic Item Economy still make my brain bleed, but YMMV.

[Deathkeeper]

Pathfinder made full casters stronger and everyone else weaker. Yes, even the Paladin (SEE: even minor infractions make you fall now, as opposed to "grossly violates").

So yea....Pathfinder is only good if you want more "WIZARDZ AND NUFFING ELS" and also a somewhat grimmdark assumed setting.

While I think it was terribly written, I feel like they wrote the paladin's code that simply (and stupidly) because everyone house-rules what it means anyway. I really hate Paladin's codes.

But yeah, I object to that second statement. Optimization is not the same as fun for some. The party I'm a GM for has no Wizard or Sorcerer and they're enjoying themselves thoroughly.

[magwaaf]

balance isn't needed. the big 3 are always the big 3 unless you gimp them out which makes them not worth playing.

pf classes are better versions of what they once were and they got rid of the save or die spells which does depower the high end casters a bit.

i've seen several builds that hit like trucks every round. specifically they were a rogue, a fighter, and a ranger. the ranger was your standard bow ranger, many shot rapid shot etc... but then he added the vital strike tree for boss fights in and really just started destroying alot of our fight

the rogue just built around rogue tricks and archetypes used made the character a damage cannon and would destroy enemies

the fighter was a 2h fighter guild and sworded out his enemies with ease

[Scow2]

Clerics got hit with a nerf, turning them into Healbots. Their turn undead ability is useless offensively, doing piddly damage and offering an easy save to completely trivialize it - seriously, Channel Energy should have been d6/level, not d6/2 levels.

A lot of the more powerful spells got hit with the nerfbat, but not enough. Save-or-dies almost disappeared (But not Save-or-sucks), as well as a lot of the most broken Metamagic feats.

However, Casters did get a buff in terms of class features - though I wish they fixed Sorcerer spellcaster progression to compete with Wizard progression, and not given Humans such a broken Favored Class bonus

[Prime32]

Clerics got hit with a nerf, turning them into Healbots. Their turn undead ability is useless offensively, doing piddly damage and offering an easy save to completely trivialize it - seriously, Channel Energy should have been d6/level, not d6/2 levels.I should point out that with the right build options it's possible to use an Empowered version of that ability as a move action, which also removes negative conditions, doesn't target enemies, and grants excess hp as temporary hp.

[Akal Saris]

Overall, my sense is that the biggest change to balance in PF comes from the skills re-work that PF did. By combining many redundant skills, lots of classes tend to make more skill rolls, while rogue-types can usually add another area of "specialization" more than they did in 3.5, and the changes to class skills makes it easier to maintain high ranks when multi-classing.

This doesn't change things at the T1-T2 level, but it tends to shift a lot of the T3-T5 classes around a bit since many of them can now solve more problems than before.

Just my 2cp.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

[Tier System stuff]

I've never understood why people talk about "worshiping" the Tier System or the like; it's descriptive (tells you about how the classes contribute and their optimizability), not prescriptive (doesn't tell you how you have to play). All the Tier System does is say "These classes are more powerful and versatile than these other classes, which are more powerful and versatile than these other classes, which are...", nothing more.

Whether you like the Tier System or not, Pathfinder is an alternate 3e. Not a pure step forward, not a pure step backward, a step to the side. Like any d20 variant on the market, it introduces as many problems as it fixes (or "fixes"), a lot of changes are matters of preference rather than of objective superiority, and a lot of widely hailed advances of the system were in fact common houserules or variants before, the same way that a lot of 3e innovations sprung from the late-2e Player Options variants or common houserules of things people didn't like about 2e.

But navar and I agree on one thing: however you feel about 3e in general you're likely to feel the same about PF, and regarding all the changes you'll either like them or just put up with them, no individual change is really different enough to be a dealbreaker.

[AttilaTheGeek]

One of the things I've noticed at casual tables is that people define "balance" by number potential. For example, I was in an undead-heavy campaign with a blaster wizard, two rogues, and a monk. And since the monk was the only optimized one, he did more damage than any of the other party members, and the other players at the table (none of whom are here on the forums) thought that monks were just an incredibly powerful class. My point is that in Pathfinder, there's room for players of any tier to at least be combat-effective.

[navar100]

I've never understood why people talk about "worshiping" the Tier System or the like; it's descriptive (tells you about how the classes contribute and their optimizability), not prescriptive (doesn't tell you how you have to play). All the Tier System does is say "These classes are more powerful and versatile than these other classes, which are more powerful and versatile than these other classes, which are...", nothing more.

Whether you like the Tier System or not, Pathfinder is an alternate 3e. Not a pure step forward, not a pure step backward, a step to the side. Like any d20 variant on the market, it introduces as many problems as it fixes (or "fixes"), a lot of changes are matters of preference rather than of objective superiority, and a lot of widely hailed advances of the system were in fact common houserules or variants before, the same way that a lot of 3e innovations sprung from the late-2e Player Options variants or common houserules of things people didn't like about 2e.

But navar and I agree on one thing: however you feel about 3e in general you're likely to feel the same about PF, and regarding all the changes you'll either like them or just put up with them, no individual change is really different enough to be a dealbreaker.

I was being a bit facetious. The problem isn't the Tier System itself but rather many people here misusing it. The misuse is regarding the Tier System as a value judgement on the worthiness of a class.

The Tier System is a good guide for letting people know the versatility of options a class has in terms of game mechanics. The closer to Tier 1, the more possible solutions to problems. The closer to Tier 5, the more chance the solution to problems will be the same, and perhaps no solution at all depending on the problem. When designing encounters, the DM has a quick reference. While I personally don't have an objection to a wizard and fighter in the same party, the recommendation of having only two tiers separate the PCs is a fair assessment for those who are concerned about class disparity.

The problem comes when people comment that Tier 1 is too powerful and should be banned. Tier 4 sucks and should be banned. If you're not playing Tier 3 you're playing the game wrong. Because the Tier System exists thus proves 3E just sucks. (Which is kind of where the OP falls into.) They use the Tier System as justification for their personal taste to become a universal truth.

[137beth]

I was being a bit facetious. The problem isn't the Tier System itself but rather many people here misusing it. The misuse is regarding the Tier System as a value judgement on the worthiness of a class.

The Tier System is a good guide for letting people know the versatility of options a class has in terms of game mechanics. The closer to Tier 1, the more possible solutions to problems. The closer to Tier 5, the more chance the solution to problems will be the same, and perhaps no solution at all depending on the problem. When designing encounters, the DM has a quick reference. While I personally don't have an objection to a wizard and fighter in the same party, the recommendation of having only two tiers separate the PCs is a fair assessment for those who are concerned about class disparity.

The problem comes when people comment that Tier 1 is too powerful and should be banned. Tier 4 sucks and should be banned. If you're not playing Tier 3 you're playing the game wrong. Because the Tier System exists thus proves 3E just sucks. (Which is kind of where the OP falls into.) They use the Tier System as justification for their personal taste to become a universal truth.

I know that some people do do exactly what you are complaining about, unfortunately.
However, I think a lot of people who talk about "banning" T1 classes refer to banning them at their own gaming table/in a particular campaign (also, on a side note, I usually am opposed to banning, I prefer nerfing/buffing/reflavoring, as that solves most issues you may have with power...)

I do not think that the OP was saying that having tiers was inherently bad. I think he was asking how it has changed since 3.5, since he wants to know what parts of his 3.5 knowledge base to throw out and what to keep in use for pf.

Also, like you, I don't mind having a T1 and a T5 in the same party, as long as you can figure out a way to make it fun for everyone. Even under the assumption that the T5 could "only" be happy if the are contributing mechanically (which may not be the case), it shouldn't be much of an issue, since a lot of the best options for T1 casters involve making it easier for the rest of the party to win.

[StreamOfTheSky]

Class imbalance is slightly worse in PF than 3E.

Wizard and Sorc got buffed (especially wizard), Cleric is about the same (godly). Druid got nerfed a fair bit but is still top tier, just beneath the others now. Paladin was buffed and is one of the few changes Paizo got right. Fighter has slightly bigger +'s but the general martial nerfs hurt more than those pointless gains. Low level Barbarian is nerfed from 3E, but by late levels it catches up. Bard has better casting but worse performance than 3E, so overall maybe a little nerfed. Ranger gained some and lost some, still about the same. Monk and Rogue are outright nerfed, and to a shocking degree.

In general, the overall game rules have been changed to buff casters and screw martials every step of the way. From the freebie "concentration ranks" now based on casting stat, to making it nearly impossible to find a race that doesn't boost a mental stat (while as in 3E it at least took some work/splats) while as making it literally impossible to find a race that buffs two physical stats (two mental stats is a-ok, though), to making all mental stat buffers share one item slot and all physical stats share one item slot so that needing multiple phys stat boosts now costs MAJOR $$, to completely neutering the combat maneuvers, to breaking up warrior feats into more feats w/ higher pre-reqs while leaving caster feats untouched...

Yeah, imbalance is worse. 3E gave casters a few completely ridiculously broken options to literally destroy the game, I admit. But I don't really care much about theoretical optimization. PF, the basics alone are more heavily weighed against the martials, so for most groups, the gap will be larger. Overcoming forbidden schools to learn the spells anyway in 3E takes effort; in PF you just plain can still cast them (at x2 slot cost...wands still work normal) without having to do anything. For example.

[Surrealistik]

How well balanced are the different classes? I have noticed some significant differences from DnD 3.5 which make some classes a bit more powered than their 3.5 counterparts. Do the tiers still apply or does this just change some of the tiers around? Doesn't it even balance things out that much?

Not very, 10char.

[Arbane]

Monk and Rogue are outright nerfed, and to a shocking degree.


How is that?

[StreamOfTheSky]

Monks:
- INA feat no longer applies to unarmed
- Fast Movement no longer adds to all forms of movement
- Flurry no longer can add natural attacks at the end (but the TWF it emulates can)
- Nerfs to maneuver feats = Monk now needs to spend feats and Int 13 to get the equivalent of 3E's Improved Trip/Disarm, despite bonus feats.
- Higher pre-reqs on feats in general means the medium BAB really hurts.
- Nerfs to maneuvers in general hurt, and grapple got especially crushed
- Other classes just plain outdo them at unarmed. For example, PF released a "brawling" armor +1 enhancement for untyped +2 on grapples and unarmed attack/damage. Light Armor only. Bracers of Armor technically is not "light armor." Suck it, monks.
- Tumble DCs are now suicidal on a class that relied on them to move around

Rogues:
- Changes to class skill system leaves them with no skills niche at all (it's just worth a +3 now); Bard's Versatile Performance, Jack of All Trades, and knowledge-based stuff actually makes him the better skill monkey now
- Trapfinding is nerfed, now the only niche it gives is disarming (not even finding) magical traps; search being wis-based means others will be better at it; detect magic is now at-will for casters to auto-find magic traps
- Sneak Attack no longer works w/ splash weapons
- Blinking no longer gives sneak attack
- Grease now only flatfoots the exact moments foes move (so you have to ready to shoot and pray, rather than just full attack)
- Tumble DCs are now suicidal on a class that relied on them to move around/flank
- This feat exists (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/flanking-foil-combat). RAW, getting hit in melee (the only place rogues can even SA reliably anymore) just plain shuts you down. Even RAI ("only" denies flanking), it's crazy broken compared to Imp. Uncanny Dodge and their respective requirements.

It's late, that's all I can think of right now, I'm sure there is more. Point is, they're nerfed, and against a backdrop of casters and monsters being buffed and most other classes getting some extra +'s. Even if those extra +'s don't do much, it's still better than being nerfed.

Regarding THE MOST HORRIBLE FEAT EVER WRITTEN, in case you missed what I mean by "RAW"... clearly it's intended to "only" deny flanking, but as written...

"Whenever you hit an adjacent opponent with a melee attack, until the start of your next turn, that opponent does not gain any flanking bonus on attack rolls while it is flanking you and cannot deal sneak attack damage to you. It can still provide a flank for its allies."

...It goes a tad bit farther... :smallfurious:

[Tumskunde]

Not familiar with this tier system you guys are using.
From my experience, the classes are about as balanced as your group.
If a player is out to min/max then no class is balanced when stacked to the rest of the group.
The various feat offerings allow for some crazy boosts to martial characters that can keep them inline with casters of any type. And Pathfinder swims in feats compared to 3.5.
The only classes that have 'dead' levels remains the cleric and wizard, but as they just gain in strength rather than gain new powers that's acceptable but still a little boring.
And there are a tonne of options that lead to some interesting and unique characters.

There was an Aasimar(Garuda) that one player made for a 12th level oneshot adventure. The character was a Monk(Master of Many Styles)/Fighter(Viking) that could inflict a staggering 11 attacks on a full attack while raging that had atleast full strength on the damage on each hit, plus specialization, plus Hammer the gap. A physical beast, using nothing but two weapon fighting and natural attacks. He stole the show, downing an adult black dragon in a single round of combat.



Still, in our current group, the warriors (A pair of fighters) consistantly out perform the the casters (Storm Druid and Sorcerer). It helps that they are 'always on' and were geared to be indepandantly useful tot he group.
One fighter is a falchion wielding Half-Ogre, the other a Glaive weilding Human. Both usually down the opponents quickly, leaving the druid and sorcerer to mop up and provide support. The sorcerer is oddly enough the primary healer of the group, and provides support through buffing. Not that the sorcerer hasn't out damaged the others with a level one spell (Shocking Grasp), but he's already figured that giving the fighters Haste and Fly can contribute more than a 10d6+10 hit that can crit on a 20. The druid was a blaster and was out done by the might of either of the fighters for much of te game, that wais until he bean opening with a summon and wildshaping into a bear. Heck he once became a mouse and rode the Half Ogre's spear, launched at the roof above the BBEG only to wildshape and grapple/maul the archmage while the group dealt with the rest of his trap.


Still, there are many options open for warriors. Fighters got a crazy boost in the fact that they get a feat every level. The Human fighter used the Eldrich Heritage (Orc) line to get a boost to his already ridiculous strength score, especially when the sorcerer gave him his Robes of Arcane Heritage after a reincarnation incident moved him further down the path to draconic ascension than his class levels warrented.


That said, the group is a lot smaller than when it began, there was at points a Barbarian, an Inquisitor, a Cleric, a Rogue and a Summoner, all of whom eventually stopped coming as schedules diverged. Even then the physical classes outdid the casters and dominated the field due to the way the players used them.
The Barbarian even charged his horse up a castle wall to save the Inquisitor and Cleric from an ambush thanks to his rage powers.

[Tumskunde]

Not trying to be a snark in this but I see a number of things you may not have taken into account.


Monks:
- INA feat no longer applies to unarmed
- Fast Movement no longer adds to all forms of movement
- Flurry no longer can add natural attacks at the end (but the TWF it emulates can)
- Nerfs to maneuver feats = Monk now needs to spend feats and Int 13 to get the equivalent of 3E's Improved Trip/Disarm, despite bonus feats.
- Higher pre-reqs on feats in general means the medium BAB really hurts.
- Nerfs to maneuvers in general hurt, and grapple got especially crushed
- Other classes just plain outdo them at unarmed. For example, PF released a "brawling" armor +1 enhancement for untyped +2 on grapples and unarmed attack/damage. Light Armor only. Bracers of Armor technically is not "light armor." Suck it, monks.
- Tumble DCs are now suicidal on a class that relied on them to move around


Archetypes and Featlines can shift the monk into a huge number of different paths.

-Archetypes can replace Flurry with other better abilities. (Fuse Styles can be used in armor)
-Feral Combat Training makes any feat requiring Improved Unarmed Attack or anything affecting your unarmed attacks also affect your natural attack(s), this includes weapon training, specialization, possibly monk damage progression, etc.
-Combine with Human's Martial Versatility and a 4 level dip in fighter to give that to all natural attacks for 3 feats(All Fighter Bonus Feats). Add in the ease at which natural attacks can be gained in pathfinder, and the Dragon Style/Ferosity feats and Two weapon fighting feats and you are set and doing better than a regular monk.
You tend to rely more on Str adding damage than anything else, and the fact that permanent magical bonuses let you qualify for feats, means that you don't need massive dex to go down the two weapon line for extra attacks.


-If you stay pure monk, there are other ways to gain abilities via the archtypes.
-Manouver Master lets you add extra manouvers per turn even if they aren't attack replacers like Feinting, Dragging, Repositioning, Bullrushing.
-Monk of the Four Winds adds elemental damage to your unarmed attacks and more.
-Zen Archers are frightening, but keep them away from society games at the moment.
-The Dimensional Agility featline allows added use of the abundant steps ability. (May act after use, use on a charge, swift action during a full attack, etc) You qualify for the entire line when it becomes available.
-Plus there are PC races with natural fly speeds at level 1, or they can gain them in short order, allowing for easier repositioning.
-There is also the Aasimar who can be Neutral or Neutral/Good and still be a Monk through a racial Trait



Rogues:
- Changes to class skill system leaves them with no skills niche at all (it's just worth a +3 now); Bard's Versatile Performance, Jack of All Trades, and knowledge-based stuff actually makes him the better skill monkey now
- Trapfinding is nerfed, now the only niche it gives is disarming (not even finding) magical traps; search being wis-based means others will be better at it; detect magic is now at-will for casters to auto-find magic traps
- Sneak Attack no longer works w/ splash weapons
- Blinking no longer gives sneak attack
- Grease now only flatfoots the exact moments foes move (so you have to ready to shoot and pray, rather than just full attack)
- Tumble DCs are now suicidal on a class that relied on them to move around/flank
- This feat exists (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/flanking-foil-combat). RAW, getting hit in melee (the only place rogues can even SA reliably anymore) just plain shuts you down. Even RAI ("only" denies flanking), it's crazy broken compared to Imp. Uncanny Dodge and their respective requirements.

It's late, that's all I can think of right now, I'm sure there is more. Point is, they're nerfed, and against a backdrop of casters and monsters being buffed and most other classes getting some extra +'s. Even if those extra +'s don't do much, it's still better than being nerfed.

Regarding THE MOST HORRIBLE FEAT EVER WRITTEN, in case you missed what I mean by "RAW"... clearly it's intended to "only" deny flanking, but as written...

"Whenever you hit an adjacent opponent with a melee attack, until the start of your next turn, that opponent does not gain any flanking bonus on attack rolls while it is flanking you and cannot deal sneak attack damage to you. It can still provide a flank for its allies."

...It goes a tad bit farther... :smallfurious:

-I prefer the new class skill system, and the rogue gains a fairly decent benifit, as the 1st point in a skill nets you +4, allowing you to specialize in certain skills and still be better than anyone in the group.
-Plus there is the Rogue talents gained every even level, and better ones available at level 10. Each nets you a gain on everything from skill use to sneak attack. Much better than gaining them at level 10/13/16/19 in 3.5.

-Trapfinding can be swapped out for other abilities, though it is still awesome at finding traps due to Perception being a class skill and the Canny Observer and Trap Spotter Rogue Talents..

-There are more enemies susceptible to sneak attacks now, plus more ways to let you qualify for it, like the scout's ablilty to sneak attack after charging or moving, couple with a sniper or knifemaster archetype and you get a lot of nice benifits, especially if you add the Charging Hurler Feat, so that you don`t have to close to deal sneak attack damage.

-The Acrobatics DC's may be higher but you also have Peerless Manouver, Fast Tumble and the Acrobat Archetype that help with it. Or there is Slow Reactions and Confounding Strikes which prevent AoO.

-Flanking Foil is a garbage feat when used against a PC rogue, but still they have to hit with a melee attack, so one can still use various ways to get around that. Like the Scout allowing for mobile sneak attacks, the combination of Enforcer/Bludgeoner Feats and Befuddling Strike allow you to nail the opponent for a preemptive sneak attack that puts them at a -4 to hit you and a -2 on anything else they want to do, though Offensive Defense gives better returns at higher levels.



Archetypes and Feats, they aren't perfect 'fixes' to your problems, but they are there, and they can totally change the nature of your character.

[neonchameleon]

Not trying to be a snark in this but I see a number of things you may not have taken into account.



Archetypes and Featlines can shift the monk into a huge number of different paths.

-Archetypes can replace Flurry with other better abilities. (Fuse Styles can be used in armor)

They can. But if you're going to do that you give up your AC bonus for starters. If you want heavier than light armour you're also giving up evasion. So the way to make a monk better is give up their class features for no direct gain.


-Feral Combat Training makes any feat requiring Improved Unarmed Attack or anything affecting your unarmed attacks also affect your natural attack(s), this includes weapon training, specialization, possibly monk damage progression, etc.

Yay. A feat tax for soemthing Monks should have as a class feature - and a feat tax that isn't relevant for most races.


-Combine with Human's Martial Versatility and a 4 level dip in fighter to give that to all natural attacks for 3 feats(All Fighter Bonus Feats). Add in the ease at which natural attacks can be gained in pathfinder, and the Dragon Style/Ferosity feats and Two weapon fighting feats and you are set and doing better than a regular monk.

In short you are doing better than a monk at being a monk by not being a monk for four levels (and being a tier 4 class at that). While true, this is simply more evidence that Monks are the oboe players of 3.X - they simultaneously suck and blow.

[navar100]

Before Pathfinder people were complaining about rogues tumbling all over the place because of the flat DCs. They were enraged the rogue could tumble through an enemy space in a corridor to flank the other side and sneak attack. They complained about the Grease spell as well, bemoaning the fact that hardly anyone ever puts rank in balance so that one spell allowed rogues to sneak attack with impunity.

As for skills, before Pathfinder and even now to some extent people were complaining about cross-class expense. That even in Pathfinder some classes still only get 2 + Int is a criticism, true, but in addition to that everyone complains about the 3E fighter's lack of skill because it's so expensive to improve important skills that aren't his class skills, like Spot.

Pathfinder fixed all that. Rogues can still tumble, but now the power of the opponent matters so as it's not so easy to tumble past the ogre as it is a hobgoblin. Now fighters can have a decent Perception if they so choose. Rogues are still better at their opposing Stealth, as they should, because of class bonus and higher Dex than a fighter's Wis, but a fighter can have +10 Perception at 10th level, something unheard of for a 10th level 3E fighter in Spot. He can have +16 if Perception is really, really important enough to him to want to spend a feat on Skill Focus. (Not a bad option. Agreed not must have, but also not never have.)

[JoshuaZ]

Not familiar with this tier system you guys are using.

Tier system (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?PHPSESSID=2f0tu75u3d4rg6nl10u4k8vb02&topic=5293) with further explanation here (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=5256.0).

[Darius Kane]

I was being a bit facetious. The problem isn't the Tier System itself but rather many people here misusing it. The misuse is regarding the Tier System as a value judgement on the worthiness of a class.
Then harp on people, not the Tier System like you always do. :smallannoyed:

[Hyde]

Then harp on people, not the Tier System like you always do. :smallannoyed:

He was? he did? Is this kind of comment really appropriate? I didn't read anything other than "Yeah, maybe people take the Tier system a little too seriously- it offers a pretty good comparison for versatility, but banning/tweaking/blah-blah-blah-ing classes because of it seems a little too much like dictating what people play."

Adding to it- as long as the players are informed about the complexity disparity (Displexity?) of the classes via the tier system, they should be allowed to make their own decisions. A player vote to say "okay, Wizards are a little ridiculous in context, let's all agree to not play them" is a thousand times better than "I am the DM, my word is law Hurr hurr hurr Tier System."

Alternately- if you don't feel that your players are savvy enough to know the difference, then the difference probably wont matter so much.

Also, wouldn't the hook bend? I mean, more than it is.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

Pathfinder fixed all that.

It's highly debatable whether they fixed that correctly, though. Rogue sneak attacks went from being a bit to too easy to trigger and far too easy to resist to being a bit too hard to trigger and far too hard to resist. Cross-class skills going away and rogues not getting any benefits to replace that means rogues are worse skill monkeys than skill-focused bards and a rogue is only +3 better at Stealth or any other skills than any other class with a good Dex--which might not even matter, if the other class has other bonuses that outweigh that +3.


He was? he did? Is this kind of comment really appropriate? I didn't read anything other than "Yeah, maybe people take the Tier system a little too seriously- it offers a pretty good comparison for versatility, but banning/tweaking/blah-blah-blah-ing classes because of it seems a little too much like dictating what people play."

Navar has a strong dislike of the Tier system and tends to badmouth it wherever it comes up, which is what Darius was referring to. Not that he's wrong in his criticism, but I can see where Darius is coming from.


Adding to it- as long as the players are informed about the complexity disparity (Displexity?) of the classes via the tier system, they should be allowed to make their own decisions. A player vote to say "okay, Wizards are a little ridiculous in context, let's all agree to not play them" is a thousand times better than "I am the DM, my word is law Hurr hurr hurr Tier System."

...aaand this is the kind of thing Darius is complaining about. The Tier system is a way to tell your group "Hey guys, wizards are a little ridiculous in context" and thereafter decide on how you want to build the party wizard (or whether you want one at all) to keep things fun. A DM doesn't need the Tier system to be a jerk, he can ban or fiat anything he wants, but having the Tier system tends to enlighten said jerk-y DMs so they focus their jerkitude on actual rather than perceived problems.

[Reverent-One]

Cross-class skills going away and rogues not getting any benefits to replace that means rogues are worse skill monkeys than skill-focused bards and a rogue is only +3 better at Stealth or any other skills than any other class with a good Dex--which might not even matter, if the other class has other bonuses that outweigh that +3.

So? They have a large skill list and more skill points than every other class in the game. Having +X instead of +Y in a single skill over members of other classes when there's little reason for the other classes not to be able to do it competently seems terribly unimportant.

EDIT: Also, Rogues do get more benefits, they're called Rogue Talents, which also generally allow more interesting benefits than simply another numerical bonus.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

So? They have a large skill list and more skill points than every other class in the game. Having +X instead of +Y in a single skill over members of other classes when there's little reason for the other classes not to be able to do it competently seems terribly unimportant.

In 3e, you can't compete with the rogue and other skillmonkeys in their areas of expertise: if you're not a skills-focused class like the bard, rogue, monk, and ranger, you can get half the bonus on Hide and Move Silently, meaning "sneaky guy" is somewhat of an exclusive schtick for them, and there were lots of skills that only the rogue (or the rogue and only one other class) could focus on to outdo other classes. This wasn't necessarily a good thing, since as you said there's little reason to prevent fighters from using Appraise or wizards from using Forgery or whatever, but it was an exclusive benefit of the rogue class.

PF opened all skills to all characters, which is definitely a step forward...but the small benefits from rogue talents don't make up for the fact that those schticks are suddenly open to all classes and those rogueish skills aren't effectively rogue class features anymore. The talents concerning Stealth, for instance, are Camouflage (takes time, only works in one terrain), Fast Stealth (reduces a movement Stealth penalty by 5), and Stealthy Sniper (reduces a sniping Stealth penalty by 10), which are limited and fairly niche benefits compared to the ability to be a stealthy commando fighter or stealth trickster wizard or whatever.

[Reverent-One]

In 3e, you can't compete with the rogue and other skillmonkeys in their areas of expertise: if you're not a skills-focused class like the bard, rogue, monk, and ranger, you can get half the bonus on Hide and Move Silently, meaning "sneaky guy" is somewhat of an exclusive schtick for them, and there were lots of skills that only the rogue (or the rogue and only one other class) could focus on to outdo other classes. This wasn't necessarily a good thing, since as you said there's little reason to prevent fighters from using Appraise or wizards from using Forgery or whatever, but it was an exclusive benefit of the rogue class.

PF opened all skills to all characters, which is definitely a step forward...but the small benefits from rogue talents don't make up for the fact that those schticks are suddenly open to all classes and those rogueish skills aren't effectively rogue class features anymore. The talents concerning Stealth, for instance, are Camouflage (takes time, only works in one terrain), Fast Stealth (reduces a movement Stealth penalty by 5), and Stealthy Sniper (reduces a sniping Stealth penalty by 10), which are limited and fairly niche benefits compared to the ability to be a stealthy commando fighter or stealth trickster wizard or whatever.

That doesn't change they're still better at them than most everyone else based on skill list and skill points per level though. So even if someone in a class that sucked at a skill in 3.5 can be decent at it instead, that doesn't remove the usefulness of the rogue's abilities. Especially for skills like stealth, where it's actually helpful for the other party members to be able to do it decently, since you'd be able to go on stealth missions without splitting the party. And it's not like any specific skill was exclusive to the rogue anyway, there were several classes for any given skill that were screwed, with the rogue simply being screwed in less skills than most. I don't see how the change really negatively affects the rogue in practice outside of bragging contests between players about the size of their characters' bonuses.

As a side note, Fast stealth reduces the penalty by 10, and shouldn't be overlooked due to the importance of mobility and getting to where ever it is you're trying to sneak to.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

That doesn't change they're still better at them than most everyone else based on skill list and skill points per level though.

That's not in question at all, I'm saying that rogues used to be much better at them than other classes and they lost quite a bit of niche protection when skills were opened up to everyone, and rogue talents don't return enough power and niche protection to keep them being the go-to "skills guys." So Pathfinder "fixed" the problem of other classes not having enough skills at the expense of the rogue, and the rogue needs to get more goodies with skills and sneak attacks to make up for it.

[Reverent-One]

That's not in question at all, I'm saying that rogues used to be much better at them than other classes and they lost quite a bit of niche protection when skills were opened up to everyone, and rogue talents don't return enough power and niche protection to keep them being the go-to "skills guys." So Pathfinder "fixed" the problem of other classes not having enough skills at the expense of the rogue, and the rogue needs to get more goodies with skills and sneak attacks to make up for it.

This I don't quite agree with, since given the statement you quoted that you apparently agree with, I don't see rogues being hurt in any significant way by this change and thus requiring more goodies.

Let me explain my thought process a little more in detail, see if there's something I'm not considering. Let's take for example a rogue and ranger in the same party, and for one reason or another, they both decide to invest in disable device (using this skill rather than stealth as the example since there's not much potential for multiple people in the party having the skill to be notably beneficial), I see one of the following situations occuring:

A) In an unlikely turn of events, either because the party feels the need or are forced to split up periodically, both of them having similar bonuses in the skill are useful to the success of the party. The rogue doesn't suffer because he's still being useful and the ranger's success benefits him as well.

B) There isn't need for more than one PC with the skill, leading to the rogue doing it most/all of the time by default, since while the difference in bonus isn't as large as it used to be, it's still there, so why wouldn't the party have the rogue do it? The rogue still doesn't suffer, the ranger might since he's wasting skill points, that is unless the ranger is doing it just because it fits his character to be trained in it.

C) The ranger is intentionally trying to show up the rogue, so he invests more than simply skill points in the skill (such as taking the Skill Focus feat, picking a specific race, or something else), allowing the ranger to catch up or maybe even surpass the rogue if he doesn't similarly increase his investment in the skill. Either this is a friendy competition between players/characters, in which case the rogue probably isn't suffering because it's fun, or the ranger player just wants to be a jerk.

If it's the ranger player being a jerk, then the rogue can just invest skill points in one of the other multitude of class skills (or one of the non-class skills he can also now more easily take). You could say the rogue suffers somewhat in this case, since skill points he already put in DD are effectively wasted, but what are the odds that the ranger player sprung this on him many levels into the game? The real problem isn't the class/not class skill system, but the fact that the ranger player is a jerk. Using the 3.5 skill system, the ranger player could just dip rogue or any classes with disable device to invest in it, take skill focus, ect and so on and achieve similar results.

So that's why, short of OOC issues with another player, I don't see the rogue being hurt in any real way by this change. Am I missing another situation where it would do so? I only see the benefit that a rogue is less required to invest in a specific skill if he doesn't want to just to have someone good with the skill in the party (or more likely, for any player to be forced to play a specific class in order to fill an arbitrary gap).

[VeisuItaTyhjyys]

So? They have a large skill list and more skill points than every other class in the game. Having +X instead of +Y in a single skill over members of other classes when there's little reason for the other classes not to be able to do it competently seems terribly unimportant.
Well, the point here is twofold. Because cross-classing penalties are minimal and the skill list was consolidated, other classes can competently cover not just the specific skills that tend to be a rogue's niche, but the role of a skill-monkey, generally. The bard now purely and inarguably outshines the rogue in terms of skill use, with decent casting and bardic performance on top of it; about all a rogue gets that a bard doesn't is sneak attack, which, as mentioned, was nerfed. To look at it from another angle, a rogue gaining a couple more skill points than a wizard (or witch, or anyone else int-based) isn't particularly relevant, since a witch can still "cover the bases" with six or seven skill points, especially with the right traits.

The reason rogues are said to be particularly screwed by this change is because they didn't really get much of anything in exchange for the loss of their niche, and they didn't have many other abilities to fall back on when it was taken from them; being the "skilled guy" was the rogue's central conceit and without that niche, the rogue is a distinctly inferior combat class with a few extra d6 to damage on increasingly rare occasions.

[Scow2]

The rogue also got a boost in the form of +4 skills/level, thanks to the consolidation of his 'Tax Skills' from 8(Tumble, Move Silently, Hide, Spot, Search, Listen, Open Lock, Disable Device) to 4(Stealth, perception, Disable Device, Acrobatics), and gaining extra functionality from the consolidated skills. And he STILL stands above the rest of the party in terms of trapfinding because he gains a free +1 every 2 levels to his search and disable device skill. Maybe at level 1 the rogue's only 3 points behind an equal-dex Trapfinder, but by level 6, he's 6 points ahead of them, and the gap only widens as the levels advance.


Well, the point here is twofold. Because cross-classing penalties are minimal and the skill list was consolidated, other classes can competently cover not just the specific skills that tend to be a rogue's niche, but the role of a skill-monkey, generally. The bard now purely and inarguably outshines the rogue in terms of skill use, with decent casting and bardic performance on top of it; about all a rogue gets that a bard doesn't is sneak attack, which, as mentioned, was nerfed. To look at it from another angle, a rogue gaining a couple more skill points than a wizard (or witch, or anyone else int-based) isn't particularly relevant, since a witch can still "cover the bases" with six or seven skill points, especially with the right traits.

The reason rogues are said to be particularly screwed by this change is because they didn't really get much of anything in exchange for the loss of their niche, and they didn't have many other abilities to fall back on when it was taken from them; being the "skilled guy" was the rogue's central conceit and without that niche, the rogue is a distinctly inferior combat class with a few extra d6 to damage on increasingly rare occasions.What is this nonsense? The rogues still get the most skill points per level, the +3 isn't a completely insignificant bonus, and rogues are still the best Trapfinders, most characters don't take cross-class skills anyway because they have their own skills needed for their niche. The Bard and Rogue compete because they're BOTH skill-monkeys, and always have been. But the rogue gets more skill points per level, and a class feature bonus to several useful skills.

[Reverent-One]

The bard now purely and inarguably outshines the rogue in terms of skill use,

I don't see it. The bard had a bigger skill list anyway, so the change to cross class skills would help them less than it would rogues.


The reason rogues are said to be particularly screwed by this change is because they didn't really get much of anything in exchange for the loss of their niche, and they didn't have many other abilities to fall back on when it was taken from them; being the "skilled guy" was the rogue's central conceit and without that niche, the rogue is a distinctly inferior combat class with a few extra d6 to damage on increasingly rare occasions.

See my previous post going over how I don't see them often losing their niche in the first place, as a smaller gap is still a gap.

[VeisuItaTyhjyys]

Again, the consolidation actually hurts the rogue, at least comparatively; in the consolidated list, less skill points are required to cover the rogue's entire niche. In other words, a wizard spends his bonus points for int covering the rogue's "tax skills" and still has enough skill points left to cover his own. This is, again, to say nothing of what classes like the bard, which are actually supposed to be skill-users, do to the rogue in his home field.


I don't see it. The bard had a bigger skill list anyway, so the change to cross class skills would help them less than it would rogues.
Sure, but Versatile Performance and Jack of All Trades help them quite a bit.


See my previous post going over how I don't see them often losing their niche in the first place, as a smaller gap is still a gap.
The issue isn't the hypothetical situation of a rogue and a ranger with the same skill in the same party, but, rather, why anyone would ever play a rogue instead of, for instance, an urban ranger; now that other classes can competently cover the rogue's niche, while also doing their own thing, there's really no reason to play a rogue, at all.


What is this nonsense? The rogues still get the most skill points per level, the +3 isn't a completely insignificant bonus,
As I noted in a response, having more skill points is less relevant when high-int classes now have enough to cover the most essential elements of your skill list. Similarly, the various and sundry traits which make a skill a class skill eliminate the +3 difference. Yeah, the rogue will have more points in, like, appraise, but that doesn't change the fact that the rogue has lost the relative exclusivity of its most vital features.


and rogues are still the best Trapfinders, most characters don't take cross-class skills anyway because they have their own skills needed for their niche. The Bard and Rogue compete because they're BOTH skill-monkeys, and always have been. But the rogue gets more skill points per level, and a class feature bonus to several useful skills.
Well, Rogues get a bonus to finding traps, casters get an unlimited use per day spell which automatically succeeds at detecting magical traps. Hm.

[Reverent-One]

Sure, but Versatile Performance and Jack of All Trades help them quite a bit.

So nothing to do with the change to class/cross class skills, got it.


The issue isn't the hypothetical situation of a rogue and a ranger with the same skill in the same party, but, rather, why anyone would ever play a rogue instead of, for instance, an urban ranger; now that other classes can competently cover the rogue's niche, while also doing their own thing, there's really no reason to play a rogue, at all.

Why play a urban ranger which loses bonuses when traveling and only gets combat bonuses against specific enemies when you can do everything an urban ranger can do with skills and then some (as you have more class skills and skill points) while not being tied to a specific area (or later on, a small handful of different areas) and instead only losing your main combat bonus against a specific subset of enemies thanks the expanded range of sneak attack targets, as well as picking up other abilities via rogue talents (extra attacks, abilties that only make them better at skills than the urban ranger could be, magic abilities, bonus feats, ect)?


As I noted in a response, having more skill points is less relevant when high-int classes now have enough to cover the most essential elements of your skill list. Similarly, the various and sundry traits which make a skill a class skill eliminate the +3 difference.

So spending additional resources to do what a rogue can do by default. And your hypothetical wizard will not be able to make all of them class skills with traits, leaving him well behind in others. Or the rogue can simply pick different skills to focus on. So your wizard takes Perception, Acrobatics, DD, Stealth, Spellcraft, and a Knowledge (which is slacking on his own supposed area of expertise), the rogue lets him and goes more the dealing with people route, taking Bluff/Diplomacy, Sense Motive, Intimidate, UMD, Sleight of Hand/Linguistics, some of the knowledge skills the Wizard missed (either the ones he has as class skills, or using traits himself to make others ones), Perception, and Stealth. The only overlap there are ones valuable for multiple people to have.


Yeah, the rogue will have more points in, like, appraise, but that doesn't change the fact that the rogue has lost the relative exclusivity of its most vital features.

Never had exclusivity in any skill anyway.

[StreamOfTheSky]

Before Pathfinder people were complaining about rogues tumbling all over the place because of the flat DCs. They were enraged the rogue could tumble through an enemy space in a corridor to flank the other side and sneak attack. They complained about the Grease spell as well, bemoaning the fact that hardly anyone ever puts rank in balance so that one spell allowed rogues to sneak attack with impunity.

As for skills, before Pathfinder and even now to some extent people were complaining about cross-class expense. That even in Pathfinder some classes still only get 2 + Int is a criticism, true, but in addition to that everyone complains about the 3E fighter's lack of skill because it's so expensive to improve important skills that aren't his class skills, like Spot.

Pathfinder fixed all that.

Yes, people complained about all that. People complained about a lot of stupid crap and were dead wrong on all of it. People yelped and moaned that Warlock was overpowered because he was like a spellcaster with infinite spells. Did being very vocal or large in number make them any less wrong than they totally freaking were? NO!!!!

"People" did not seem to realize that the fairly weak, MAD (multiple ability dependent), and squishy Rogue and Monk depended on those "easy" tumble DCs to do their damn jobs. In a game where casters literally get teleport spells from first ****ing level, the ability to auto succeed at skirmishing unscathed is not some uber game breaking, unheard of capability. Easy tumbling annoyed people. The class skill rules were definitely punishing. Even a deity flops around like a dweeb in a pool of grease if he was too much of a moron to put ranks in balance or just hover/fly around all the time. But all these things existed for a purpose.

But yes, Paizo fixed these "problems" and not surprisingly, by NERFING* the rogue and monk, the rogue and monk are both now much weaker than they were in 3E. Perhaps if they had bothered to make up for the losses with gains (preferably more gains, since the end result you'd hope for is a buff to the two classes), it wouldn't have been a problem, but...they didn't bother doing that at all.

*That was the whole point of this, wasn't it? That they were nerfed? You don't seem to actually be disputing that they were, merely trying to tell me why rogue and monk getting ground into the pavement when they weren't that great (especially monk) to begin with was GOOD game design...somehow.


Rogues can still tumble, but now the power of the opponent matters so as it's not so easy to tumble past the ogre as it is a hobgoblin.

No, just no. What the rogue can do now is try to optimize Acrobatics as hard as possible and still have at best a ~70% success rate, with the rate actually plunging lower and lower as you gain in levels, because guess what CMD is just as broken a sham as 3E monster grapple modifiers were, except now you're exporting all of that wonderful brokenness to a skill check! Yay!

What happens when you try to skirmish w/ PF tumble and fail half the time? That means the enemy is getting 1.5x as many attacks as you. If you had equal damage output, AC, and health... you'd basically lose every time. Since you're a rogue or monk...you're almost certainly worse in all categories, too. Tumbling is literally suicidal.

Even if the difficulty wasn't completely borked (it is), even if BAB actually had anything at all to do with "martial skill" (it doesn't; just ask any dumb giant pile of HD monster), tying tumble to CMD would still be patently unfair. You're investing skill points and the defender invests nothing, it just goes up automatically from leveling. Not to mention larger enemies should actually be EASIER to nimbly avoid, strength has absolutely no business opposing tumble, and AC-boosting effects like deflection making tumble harder is riotously funny when the whole point of tumble is to avoid the other guy... *sigh* I don't have time for this. No amount of facts, basic statistics, appeals to class balance, or reason will ever appeal to the people who like PF's tumble changes anyway...

It is rather pathetic how you never see them crying foul over the fact that paizo thinks rogues and monks 100% avoiding AoOs is broken, but literally every single spellcaster in PF has a way to do so is A-OK. Granted, some cases are simply, "teleporting, duh!" but there's also quite a few low level spells that are straight up, "Move without provoking. At all. Suck it, Rogues and Monks."

[Susano-wo]

yeah, I gotta go with A: love the new cross class system, though I will say that it makes dipping perhaps a bit too valuable, though I don't know how to fix that without descending into the old horribleness of "why even try to take that skill?"

Rogues don't suffer aside from *maybe* against bards, but even then I don't think so. rogue talents give you cool perks RE skills that no one else can get(full spd sneaking, 10ft automatic trap detect attemps, etc, as well as being able to modify your SA), and they get specific class bonuses vs traps. y'now, that no one else does.

Maybe I'm just not optimized enough to see this, but I've never really seen grease as a primary SA granter, though even with PFs grease, they still provoke unless they have invested in acrobatics if they, know, try to move outside the area. So they are locked down or risk you sneak attacking their ass if you pop, say, 10ft away. not as easy, sure, but still doable

so I really don't see there being s nerf to SA-ability, especially since you can now SA more critters

RE Tumble. I like the idea of what they did (always thought it was silly that no one, no matter how martially skilled they are, or how nimble they are themselves can affect how hard it is to tumble past me in such a way as to completely avoid the consequences), but I can see the argument that the DC is borked.)

[The Grue]

It's highly debatable whether they fixed that correctly, though. Rogue sneak attacks went from being a bit to too easy to trigger and far too easy to resist to being a bit too hard to trigger and far too hard to resist. Cross-class skills going away and rogues not getting any benefits to replace that means rogues are worse skill monkeys than skill-focused bards and a rogue is only +3 better at Stealth or any other skills than any other class with a good Dex--which might not even matter, if the other class has other bonuses that outweigh that +3.

Don't underestimate that +3. Remember it's +3 to a 20-sided die roll; what it means is that, all other things being equal, the character that has Stealth as a class skill is 15% more likely to succeed than the high Dex character who doesn't.

+3 may not seem like a lot when you get into the high levels and start rolling with +20-30 skill bonuses, but, again all other things being equal that +3 is still 15%.

[Scow2]

RE Tumble. I like the idea of what they did (always thought it was silly that no one, no matter how martially skilled they are, or how nimble they are themselves can affect how hard it is to tumble past me in such a way as to completely avoid the consequences), but I can see the argument that the DC is borked.)

I agree with this - but it made it WAY too hard. Also - size of the opponent works against the tumbler, instead of in its favor.

Personally, I hate the whole CMD/CMB simplification, because it applies 3.5's Monster Grapple Bonus shenanigans against EVERYTHING. It used to be that different techniques could strike a different weakness in a target, but they got rid of that.

[Reverent-One]

I agree with this - but it made it WAY too hard. Also - size of the opponent works against the tumbler, instead of in its favor.


I agree, though I've seen an alternative rule that looks pretty good, but haven't seen it in play yet. Have the DC be 10 + BAB + Dex (optionally including the size bonus as a penalty and vise versa). Still provides a scaling DC based on the speed and combat capability of the enemy, but without all the other random stats stacked on as well.

[stack]

Fighter and Paladin got boosted enough to push them into Tier 4 (Monk didn't). Bard probably dropped to Tier 4. And Druid dropped to Tier 2.

Of the new classes, Summoner is a very strong Tier 2 and possibly even Tier 1. Gunslinger's Tier 5. Magus, Inquisitor, and Alchemist are all (I think) Tier 3. Oracle's classic Tier 2. I haven't seen a Witch or a Cavalier in play - the Witch is either Tier 1 or Tier 2 depending on the spell list and the Cavalier is a Tier 4 who's largely pointless in dungeons.

So yeah, there were tweaks. And the balance is slightly improved but doesn't match the balance and diversity of a party containing one each of Warblade, Swordsage, Crusader, Bard, Dread Necromancer, Psychic Warrior, Wildshape Ranger, Beguiler, and Binder.

Just a tier note; there is rarely confusion between a tier 1 and a tier 2. A witch is a prepared caster with level 9 spells. The witch cannot be tier 2, either she is 1 or 3 depending on how gamebreaking the class is. I suppose its possible that a full list prepared caster could be two if their list only granted one game breaking option, but that would take a very specific list. I would count witches firmly in tier 1.

On the same note, summoners CAN'T be tier 1. A limited list of known spells denies that to them, even is summons are very versatile.

I think most rate cavaliers as tier 5 do to the limitations of mounted combat. I'm on the fence, but suffice to say they are very build and campaign dependent.

Some monks archetypes can hit tier 4, monk may be the class that 'swings' the most with its archetypes.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

Don't underestimate that +3. Remember it's +3 to a 20-sided die roll; what it means is that, all other things being equal, the character that has Stealth as a class skill is 15% more likely to succeed than the high Dex character who doesn't.

+3 may not seem like a lot when you get into the high levels and start rolling with +20-30 skill bonuses, but, again all other things being equal that +3 is still 15%.

You say "all other things being equal," but as I noted that's not necessarily going to be the case. It's possible for a sorcerer or paladin to invest in the four social skills and outdo the rogue despite them not all being class skills, because they're Cha-heavy while the rogue is likely focusing on Dex and Int and their Cha > the rogue's Cha, and the same for other skills based on other classes' key abilities.

Again, this isn't the end of the world--it's a good thing that other classes can be social, and the rogues talents do provide a few nice perks--but the rogue and bard have gone from being the face classes to being one of several, and same for other specialties. It's like the wu jen in 3e: sure, it's a good enough class on its own and has some nice perks, but if you look at most wu jen characters online they're only wu jen because of a few specific wu jen-only spells; find a way to add those spells to another list or houserule that sorcerers and wizards can learn them without giving the wu jen other nice things, and suddenly pretty much every former wu jen becomes a wizard because it has the spells the player wanted and is better in other areas.

[Tumskunde]

Well after reading up on the tier system, thank you JoshuaZ for that, I can say that it's *probably* flawed, atleast from my point of view.
While it tried to categorize the classes into a scale that DM's can use to gauge the stength of the party they are dealing with, it fails to take into consideration that there's also the players behind the characters.
I've seen so called Teir 1 classes played as if they were Tier 5 by the standards of the guide and vice versa, so it's flawed in that regard.
If we're catagorizing the player solely by his class then it's almost useless, as the character is so much more than thier class, they are an idea, an avatar and an icon for the Player. And each Player is an individual, no two exactly alike, and most so drastically different that it's a wonder they get along enough to game.

I've played with players who could take a Fighter, nae even a Commoner and end the world in a way you wouldn't expect, not just in Pathfinder, he did it in 2nd, 3.5, 4th, Lot5R, Rifts, Paladium, Heros Unlimited, etc. It would take them time and that is all. So for me, the power balance is really something that can only be gauged individually group to group, and only after playing a game or 3 to work out the kinks in thier playing style.

Pathfinder's Balance, to which the thread is actually about, is fairly solid.
At least from what I have seen and experienced.
Rogues are still rogues, mages are still mages, fighters are still fighters, and bards are actually useful when played by the right people. :smallwink: But in all seriousness, no one class has ever outshone the others, it's usually been the players who shine, and it doesn't matter what class they play.


Now then.




Not trying to be a snark in this but I see a number of things you may not have taken into account.

Archetypes and Featlines can shift the monk into a huge number of different paths.

-Archetypes can replace Flurry with other better abilities. (Fuse Styles can be used in armor)They can. But if you're going to do that you give up your AC bonus for starters. If you want heavier than light armour you're also giving up evasion. So the way to make a monk better is give up their class features for no direct gain.
If I was going that route, ala Fusing Styles in armour, then I'm swaping evasion for toughess and natural armour (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/monk/archetypes/paizo---monk-archetypes/monk-of-the-sacred-mountain), so may as well point out that it's a posibility, as you only lose the Wis+1 dodge mod if you're wearing armour and that's simple as I wouldn't have a great score in that stat.
A little snarky there, I do apologise, but I believe that the gentleman was mentioning a build where a monk used flurry of blows and added natural attacks on top for extra cheese, which can't happen in Pathfinder, due to how flurry of blows currently works.

Infact, I've found that if you want to use natural attacks and a 'flurry of blows' style manouver, you're better off being an unarmed two-weapons fighter who uses the Dragon Style and Dragon Ferocity to add more strength mod to all your attacks when combined with feral combat training.

I built such a warrior for 'fun', it uses 2 levels of Monk, 2 levels of Ranger and atleast 4 levels of fighter with the possibiliy of Barbarian thrown in. You don't need wisdom, so it's not improved, and if you take Human Aasimar who in all otherways are Human due to the Scion of Humanity trait, the 'feat tax' dies out and you can specialise in Unarmed and apply all those affects onto your natural attacks due to Feral Combat Training and Marital Versitility.
The Monk levels aren't even required, as you can easily use the Unarmed Fighter archetype to get the Style feats sans requirements, but you get more bonus feats this way and can choose another archetype, or pack 4 styles feats in 4 levels ignoring requirements by taking them 2+2.
By Level 12, with a BAB of +11 the character in question had 11 attacks (6 itterative and 5 natural) That if all hit, then you got a total x13 strength mode damage added across all 11 attacks and an additional +33 damage from feats and class abilities. Not counting that there is a feat that adds +1 damage per each additional hit you inflict, which could add another 49 damage. Oh and they could Rage and possibly add more natural attacks to the mix, like a gore or negative energy slam. You could skip the Ranger and just take claws when you rage, letting you get on the road to getting pounce at barbarian 10.
There were also options like taking Eldrich Heritage, specifically the Orc or Abyssal lines to get an added +2/4/6 strength and other abilities.
The character could also be a face with added fact that it had a decent (Atleast 15) Cha score and could easily take 'social skills' as class skills through archetypes and character traits.

But still that character was not a monk, it was someone who was specialised in a particular form of unarmed combat. And created through a min/max thought style, which I particularly do not like using when making a character I'm seriously going to play.
Monks are so much more than punching things. You have kungfu powers, the ability to be versitile and still specialize in various aspects of play, a wide range of skills, and the added bonus of taking feats you don't qualify for.
I've seen a monk that did nothing more than disrupt the enemy group so that the rest of the party could steam roll them, by tripping, disarming, dishing out physical/verbal insults and jokes that had the enemy demoralised and the players in stiches around the table.



Rogues too, they got the ability to shift form being a 'Jack of all trades' type with decent combat abilities, to being able to be a 'Master of Trades' who can hit DC 30-40's without rolling by level 10-12 that can kick even more ass. (10+sp, Skillfocus+6 and Stat bonus, Skill Mastery gives you a take 10 in situations where you normally couldn't)
You can be a face, a shadow, a knife, or a con, or all at the same time.
If you have difficulty 'tumbling' through a place, then look at your options.
A rogue can easily bring out Sleight of Hand and Use Magic Device and pop a wand of invisibility.
Drop a smoke bomb (Ninja Trick) and hide.
Use the Gang up feat to flank without needing to be isolated from the group.
Have an ally provide you with an Escape Route using the team feat of the same name.
Heck if you get a sneak attack opportunity and have to bail you can just use a flavored sneak attack (Slow Reactions, Confounding Strike) that prevents the opponent from using AoO's and then book it around them.

I've used Slow Reactions on a dragon so that the warriors could charge in and avoid the dragon's reach as it couldn't use AoO's. All by skirmishing into position and throwing a dagger.

Maybe if you can't solve the problem one way, look at it from another?
After all a rogue needs more than one trick, and should be the most prepared member of the party, not even the wizard should come close.
Speaking of that, you might have a decent Cha score, well then Eldrich Heritage line nets you a Host of powers that can get you out of jail.
The most thematic and synergistic being the Shadow Bloodline, you get added stealth abilities, debilitive attacks and teleport powers.
Others like Fey (Invisibility) and Djinni(Turn into a whirlwind) are fun, while the warp ability gotten from Daemon comes late and it's gruesome.
Need a flank, use Unwitting Ally to make an enemy your flanking partner.
Plus you can get a Ki Pool with talents and qualify for Gliding steps which lets you ignore AoO's and use a host of Ninja Techniques.
So while they weren't Tumbling through an enemy's square, in most cases there you didn't have to.

Just food for thought.




Even if the difficulty wasn't completely borked (it is), even if BAB actually had anything at all to do with "martial skill" (it doesn't; just ask any dumb giant pile of HD monster), tying tumble to CMD would still be patently unfair. You're investing skill points and the defender invests nothing, it just goes up automatically from leveling. Not to mention larger enemies should actually be EASIER to nimbly avoid, strength has absolutely no business opposing tumble, and AC-boosting effects like deflection making tumble harder is riotously funny when the whole point of tumble is to avoid the other guy... *sigh* I don't have time for this. No amount of facts, basic statistics, appeals to class balance, or reason will ever appeal to the people who like PF's tumble changes anyway...
I'll put my 2 cents on this one, again not picking a fight with you, just what you said doesn't make sense to me.

CMD translates into roughly:
BAB - Training/Skill/Talent/Viciousness
Str - Physical Prowess/Brute Force
Dex - Physical Cooridination/Agility
Size -Size of area you have to navigate, the smaller the easier.
Misc mods are:
circumstance - Rarely come up with acrobatics, but maybe you're heading into strong winds or across ther face?
deflection - They just need to stop you, that can be as simple as forcing you into the ground, and an invisible force around the creature is possibly added reach you cannot see to avoid. Same principle as forcefield deflection really.
dodge - This is quickness or corodination that was gained from other sources than your physical form.
insight, luck, morale, profane, and sacred - Should all be self explanitory.

Tumbling/Moving/Dodging past someone who is actively trying to stop you without getting hit is hard, even when they aren't trying to kill you.
In sports, where I'm drawing from personal experience, you don't just have your coordination to stop someone from getting past, it's also your strength to get you in position and keep you in place so that they can't get past, if you're bigger it's easier to keep them coraled, you also need what ever other quickness, luck and sheer grit you've got to stop them, and if the gods want to get in on it, then so be it.
Sure I might not be trying to kill my opponent, but I'll be damned if I let them past me without a fight.

So Pathfinder's Acrobatics is a bit more 'realistic' than 3.5's Tumble, when dealing with trying to move past someone who will try and stop you.
And while realistic ma not always be better, I often found that the 3.5 Tumble was ridiculous due to the ease at which my Dwarven Fighter in Fullplate tumbled around the battlefield past hordes of skeletons to knock out thier necromancer, not that he needed to with his ridiculous AC, but often there was no clear straight path he could use Jump to clear, and I never got to take bullrush feats.

[Darius Kane]

I've seen so called Teir 1 classes played as if they were Tier 5 by the standards of the guide and vice versa, so it's flawed in that regard.
If you re-read the Tier System (in its entirety) you'll notice that it's not.


If we're catagorizing the player solely by his class then it's almost useless
Again, re-read it, because you are wrong. The Tier System categorizes classes, not players or builds.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

I've seen so called Teir 1 classes played as if they were Tier 5 by the standards of the guide and vice versa, so it's flawed in that regard.
If we're catagorizing the player solely by his class then it's almost useless, as the character is so much more than thier class, they are an idea, an avatar and an icon for the Player. And each Player is an individual, no two exactly alike, and most so drastically different that it's a wonder they get along enough to game.

I've played with players who could take a Fighter, nae even a Commoner and end the world in a way you wouldn't expect, not just in Pathfinder, he did it in 2nd, 3.5, 4th, Lot5R, Rifts, Paladium, Heros Unlimited, etc. It would take them time and that is all. So for me, the power balance is really something that can only be gauged individually group to group, and only after playing a game or 3 to work out the kinks in thier playing style.

As Darius mentioned, the Tier system takes that into account; specifically, it ranks classes by power and versatility assuming equal skill on the part of the player. So a player who can break the game into two pieces with a Tier 5 class can blow it into a bazillion fragments with a Tier 1 class, and a player who can hardly contribute when playing a Tier 1 class won't be able to contribute at all when playing a Tier 5 class and might actually be actively harmful to the party's chances of survival.

[Scow2]

As Darius mentioned, the Tier system takes that into account; specifically, it ranks classes by power and versatility assuming equal skill on the part of the player. So a player who can break the game into two pieces with a Tier 5 class can blow it into a bazillion fragments with a Tier 1 class, and a player who can hardly contribute when playing a Tier 1 class won't be able to contribute at all when playing a Tier 5 class and might actually be actively harmful to the party's chances of survival.

I think I'd disagree - A poorly-played fighter tends to be better than a poorly-played wizard.

[Doug Lampert]

I think I'd disagree - A poorly-played fighter tends to be better than a poorly-played wizard.

JaronK (who largely wrote the system) agrees with this claim.
He's trying to measure the class's power and options, a wizard has power and options at any optimization level, including the option to suck.


I'm actually going to defend this statement, except it's not "optimization" but "player competence." Every class was considered balanced by the initial play testers, because they didn't know what they were doing. The play test Wizard was just a blaster... fireball all day long. The play test Druid used a scimitar in combat and didn't use Wildshape in combat. The play test Cleric was a heal bot. And as such they were all about the same power level. But that's not optimization... get a different player with those same characters, and suddenly that safe Wizard could cast Animate Dead and have an army of minions (or just a few shockingly strong ones) that were better than the Fighter. That Druid could have Wild Shaped into a Dire Ape and rocked out (probably with a Quarterstaff buffed by various spells). And so on. So that's not optimization (how your character is built to do the job) but rather what you chose to do with the character.

Of course, the Wizard class still had more power than the Fighter class, so his Tier ranking was the same. But that power was being used to, well, suck. And Tier 1s are good at everything. Even sucking if they want. Frankly, a Wizard can suck even more than a Fighter could ever dream of sucking. A Fighter can stab himself to death, but only a Wizard could Plane Shift to some horrible far realm to be tortured for an eternity of insanity.

JaronK

[PairO'Dice Lost]

JaronK (who largely wrote the system) agrees with this claim.
He's trying to measure the class's power and options, a wizard has power and options at any optimization level, including the option to suck.

While JaronK characterized the playtest party as incompetent, he's actually talking about a suboptimal wizard in that example that can be played more or less competently, just as having an optimized wizard build doesn't make you competent at playing--witness the difference between experienced forum optimizers who can build and play full T1 monstrosities and new players who just grab a build from CharOp and then wonder why they're not winning every encounter.

A non-wild-shaping melee druid or a blaster wizard or a S&B fighter is suboptimal, but those aren't poorly-played, necessarily, just poorly-built. But if you can't take a basic blaster wizard (whose options are basically "you have X fireballs, Y scorching rays, and Z magic missiles, point and shoot, have fun") and at least somewhat help your party with that, then even a basic fighter (who has to deal with circumstance bonuses, positioning, differing attack bonuses, and so forth instead of "ready aim fireball") isn't going to help out the party, and in fact will probably just run in and get himself killed. That's the kind of character I was talking about, to contrast with Tumskunde's "commoner who can end the world" example.

[JadePhoenix]

Wow. Buckets of hate for Pathfinder. I'm surprised you guys read it if you hate it so much.

[Darius Kane]

Wow. Buckets of hate for Pathfinder. I'm surprised you guys read it if you hate it so much.
Actually for some of us it's quite the opposite.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

Wow. Buckets of hate for Pathfinder. I'm surprised you guys read it if you hate it so much.

One generally doesn't care about fixing balance problems in a game one hates. I'm incredibly disappointed that PF didn't live up to its full potential and neglected to fix/tweak things that should have been obvious, but I don't hate it. That honor I reserve for games like d20 Modern. :smallwink:

[Scow2]

One generally doesn't care about fixing balance problems in a game one hates. I'm incredibly disappointed that PF didn't live up to its full potential and neglected to fix/tweak things that should have been obvious, but I don't hate it. That honor I reserve for games like d20 Modern. :smallwink:

Hey! I like d20 Modern, even if it could have used a better way to start past level 1 and been hit with some of D&D 3.5's updates to the underlying system.

[MukkTB]

The tier system explicitly says that its a judge of classes. It assumes equal skill from players when comparing two classes. When you take average skill into account it works out ok. However there is a flaw. Not every class has the same response to player skill. In play, a low skilled Wizard is about on par with a low skilled fighter. In fact, the very same attitude that drops the wizard from its T1 heights of glory make a halfway decent fighter. What we're talking about is the class floor and the class ceiling.

The tier system is written by an optimizer. It has a clear view of the classes ceilings. However it did not really take a close look at the floor. To get an accurate reading of the floor you have to figure out what a noobie who was trying would actually do. On this forum a search for the floor generally results in anti optimization. You get warriors who automagically kill themselves on a swing and casters who turn themselves into psychic sandwiches. These are obviously not real examples of what a noobie would do in play.

Skill is not measurable. It takes more skill to know that a two handed weapon is better than a sword and board. There is however, no numeric rating for judging a player based off that decision.

In my play group casters are valuable. However they never quite live up to the standard of a tier 1 character as established on these boards. Our group relies on its fighters to carry the day. We are a low skill group.


As to pathfinder balance, I'm not as happy with pure pathfinder as I am with pure 3.5. 3.5 has Tome of Battle, which gives us a nice things for fighter types. When you cut out ToB, you're slapping those guys in the face. From just that I'd have to say PF only does not offer as much balance.

[navar100]

Be careful with that word "judge". What the Tier System measures is the versatility of the classes and the potential of doing stuff. What it does not do, of which "judge" usually refers, is make a value judgement on the worth of playing a class. A class is not The Suck or The Awesome just because it's in a particular Tier.

[MukkTB]

I'd say judge is actually a better term. We're not making precise measurements of versatility or power. We have no standard of measurement or agreed upon method of indexing different abilities. We're eyeballing the thing and making our best judgement. In this case not good or bad, but powerful or weak, versatile or not. The only way we have of arriving on any degree of accuracy here is through consensus.

And even if you don't say good or bad, Goodfun or Wrongfun, you're still laying down a verdict when you say strong or weak.

[The Grue]

You say "all other things being equal," but as I noted that's not necessarily going to be the case. It's possible for a sorcerer or paladin to invest in the four social skills and outdo the rogue despite them not all being class skills, because they're Cha-heavy while the rogue is likely focusing on Dex and Int and their Cha > the rogue's Cha, and the same for other skills based on other classes' key abilities.

If a Sorcerer wants to be the party face, they take Charm Person as a spell - and then problem there is not just with the rogue, it's with casters in general. And hey, if the Paladin wants to contribute to something out of combat I say let him. Meanwhile the Bard can still take Charm Person, and gets to hypnotize to boot.

I would posit that the Bard is just as good a face class as the Sorcerer, and that if you're playing a vanillia rogue as the guy in the spotlight you're doing it wrong.

[Scow2]

People honestly thought the Rogue was supposed to hold Party Face? In 3.5, the rogue didn't have the skillpoints to take on that responsibility and still do what he needs to do, and even if he did focus on being a "Social Rogue", the Bard would ALWAYS outperform him, even with minimal optimization. Followed closely by the Paladin and Sorcerer, with Rogue as a "Fourth" in the "Party Face" slot.

Complaining about the Rogue being forced out of a niche it never had by the classes that were built around that role really doesn't make sense to me. The "Social Rogue"'s strength was its breadth, not depth, in that role.

[Slipperychicken]

People honestly thought the Rogue was supposed to hold Party Face?


Like, half the Rogue Tricks are face skills, and a third of their archetypes with names like "charlatan" and "spy" boost them, and the social skills are class skills for them. Of course they're supposed to be good at it.

Their fluff supports it too.

Life is an endless adventure for those who live by their wits. Ever just one step ahead of danger, rogues bank on their cunning, skill, and charm to bend fate to their favor. Never knowing what to expect, they prepare for everything, becoming masters of a wide variety of skills, training themselves to be adept manipulators, agile acrobats, shadowy stalkers, or masters of any of dozens of other professions or talents. Thieves and gamblers, fast talkers and diplomats, bandits and bounty hunters, and explorers and investigators all might be considered rogues, as well as countless other professions that rely upon wits, prowess, or luck. Although many rogues favor cities and the innumerable opportunities of civilization, some embrace lives on the road, journeying far, meeting exotic people, and facing fantastic danger in pursuit of equally fantastic riches. In the end, any who desire to shape their fates and live life on their own terms might come to be called rogues.

Role: Rogues excel at moving about unseen and catching foes unaware, and tend to avoid head-to-head combat. Their varied skills and abilities allow them to be highly versatile, with great variations in expertise existing between different rogues. Most, however, excel in overcoming hindrances of all types, from unlocking doors and disarming traps to outwitting magical hazards and conning dull-witted opponents.

[StreamOfTheSky]

Wow. Buckets of hate for Pathfinder. I'm surprised you guys read it if you hate it so much.

If you're well read and educated on something and don't like it: "Wow, why did you even read it so much?"

If you don't actually know much on a topic but hate it anyway: "You're just being ignorant, you don't even know the topic that well."

The lesson: There's no excuse ever to dislike something, you're always wrong for being a negative nellie. :smallannoyed:

[TuggyNE]

If you're well read and educated on something and don't like it: "Wow, why did you even read it so much?"

If you don't actually know much on a topic but hate it anyway: "You're just being ignorant, you don't even know the topic that well."

The lesson: There's no excuse ever to dislike something, you're always wrong for being a negative nellie. :smallannoyed:

Pretty sure you can even come up with similar criticisms for the other two cases (read it, like it; didn't read it, like it).

People can always find something to gripe at you about, however unreasonable.

[StreamOfTheSky]

I'll put my 2 cents on this one, again not picking a fight with you, just what you said doesn't make sense to me.

CMD translates into roughly:
BAB - Training/Skill/Talent/Viciousness
Str - Physical Prowess/Brute Force
Dex - Physical Cooridination/Agility
Size -Size of area you have to navigate, the smaller the easier.

BAB: Again, BAB is not this. Lots of big dump high HD monsters have huge BAB and can't honestly be considered to have "skill."
Str: How does being powerful help you move to block a tumbler's path? It doesn't.
Dex: the only thing here that actually SHOULD apply.
Size: Exactly the opposite. It should be easier to move around/through bigger creatures. Hell, there's even a rule for moving through occupied spaces of much larger creatures, which you normally need acrobatics to do successfully (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/combat#TOC-Moving-Through-a-Square).
Any creature can move through a square occupied by a creature three size categories larger than itself.


Misc mods are:
circumstance - Rarely come up with acrobatics, but maybe you're heading into strong winds or across ther face?
deflection - They just need to stop you, that can be as simple as forcing you into the ground, and an invisible force around the creature is possibly added reach you cannot see to avoid. Same principle as forcefield deflection really.
dodge - This is quickness or corodination that was gained from other sources than your physical form.
insight, luck, morale, profane, and sacred - Should all be self explanitory.

Circumstance, Insight, morale, profane, luck, and sacred: How are they self-explanatory? Please explain. To me, they're just various flavors of "you're harder to hit, just...'cause!"
Deflection: bs, you're doing your best to not collide with them, that they have a skintight forcefield around them doesn't affect your tumbling one bit. You either collide with them or not. If anything, their deflection would *help* you...
Dodge: It is quickness/reaction, but it's also in regards to avoidance (while as dex applies to more things). Probably shouldn't apply.


Tumbling/Moving/Dodging past someone who is actively trying to stop you without getting hit is hard, even when they aren't trying to kill you.
In sports, where I'm drawing from personal experience, you don't just have your coordination to stop someone from getting past, it's also your strength to get you in position and keep you in place so that they can't get past, if you're bigger it's easier to keep them coraled, you also need what ever other quickness, luck and sheer grit you've got to stop them, and if the gods want to get in on it, then so be it.
Sure I might not be trying to kill my opponent, but I'll be damned if I let them past me without a fight.

And from my experience, in Capoeira, how well you fight with a sword, or throw a kick has next to nothing to do with preventing someone from tumbling around you. That relies on stance, footing, agility, your own ability to read the other person's motion (basically, by knowing the tricks yourself), and so forth. Being bigger is great for threatening at a further reach, but your senses and field of vision are no greater just by being bigger; having a wider area to guard makes it harder to keep someone from slipping past.


So Pathfinder's Acrobatics is a bit more 'realistic' than 3.5's Tumble, when dealing with trying to move past someone who will try and stop you.
And while realistic ma not always be better, I often found that the 3.5 Tumble was ridiculous due to the ease at which my Dwarven Fighter in Fullplate tumbled around the battlefield past hordes of skeletons to knock out thier necromancer, not that he needed to with his ridiculous AC, but often there was no clear straight path he could use Jump to clear, and I never got to take bullrush feats.

I dispute it's more realistic. And the game is completely unrealistic anyway, and trying to hold noncasters to "realim" past like 5th level means you're making it a personal goal for them to suck and be worthless in a world of magic.
Opposing it w/ a BAB-based stat, which comes for free from levelling up and may or may not include any training at all to counter a tumbler, instead of a skill check, is unfair and silly.
Tumble was not ridiculous in 3E, and your claims of "ease," especially in full plate (huge check penalties) are curious. "Easy" at what level, exactly? Even if none of the myriad of possible DC increases applies, DC 15 is not automatic until at least 5th level, more likely ~8th level. While casters can fly and teleport well before this and don't even have "skirmishing" or "tactical mobility" as one of their assumed primary schticks.

And on that topic, if 3E tumble was "ridiculous," why are you not complaining about PF's various SPELLS that let you automatically avoid AoOs for moving. The best "skirmisher" in PF is a Magus, true fact. Bladed Dash (level 2 spell, available at 4th level, earlier than auto-tumble in 3E is) + Spell Combat = the ability to flawlessly skirmish with a full attack plus an extra attack for good measure! How come that is "ok," but the poor rogue or monk merely trying to attack once and safely move is broken?

But fine. You don't like the actual skirmishing classes being the best...or even 5th best at actually skirmishing? Fine. Give them full BAB, higher HD, and better combat class features to make up for it. The whole deal in 3E was, "yeah, they can't hang in melee, but at least they can choose to drop in or out as they please." You want to take *that* away, you don't want them to have spells... give them something so they're not squishy anymore. For ****'s sake....

[Tumskunde]

Allright let's try this again. I'm used to getting misunderstood, due to the fact that I have a difficulty using english properly convey my thoughts.

BAB: Again, BAB is not this. Lots of big dump high HD monsters have huge BAB and can't honestly be considered to have "skill."
Str: How does being powerful help you move to block a tumbler's path? It doesn't.
Dex: the only thing here that actually SHOULD apply.
Size: Exactly the opposite. It should be easier to move around/through bigger creatures. Hell, there's even a rule for moving through occupied spaces of much larger creatures, which you normally need acrobatics to do successfully (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/combat#TOC-Moving-Through-a-Square).
Any creature can move through a square occupied by a creature three size categories larger than itself.
Circumstance, Insight, morale, profane, luck, and sacred: How are they self-explanatory? Please explain. To me, they're just various flavors of "you're harder to hit, just...'cause!"
Deflection: bs, you're doing your best to not collide with them, that they have a skintight forcefield around them doesn't affect your tumbling one bit. You either collide with them or not. If anything, their deflection would *help* you...
Dodge: It is quickness/reaction, but it's also in regards to avoidance (while as dex applies to more things). Probably shouldn't apply.

I've always seen BAB as an abstract rating of how dangerous one is to one's opponent. This in human's is interpreted as skill as we are useless unless we train ourselves as we have few instinctive controls. In other creatures it can be a bit different.
Is a T-Rex dangerous? Yes it could easily kill me if we were to fight toe to toe. Same with a Bull, a Tiger and a Giant Squid.
The ability to fight, kill and defend themselves is both hardwired into thier instincts and also a learned behaviour. Just look at dogs, once they are trained, they can be deadly opponents.
All those critters have a supposed Int of 1+, they have both an instinctive and learned use of thier physical abilities, and the bigger (More HD) they are usually translates into more time for them to learn to fight, to kill.

Strength and Dexterity. We're probably not on the same page on how we interpret these stats. My definition comes from my years playing 2ed, so the use of these makes sense.
Strength is Speed, how fast you move your body. Speed is Power, how much acceleration you inflict on objects to either move them or strike them. And thus Power is Speed. It represents the muscles which move you. And so if you can't move you can't stop anyone from tumbling past you.
Dexterity is coordination, how likely you are going to do a precise task. Coordination plus Speed equals Agility, adding acceleration to your precision lets you accomplish more for less. Without speed you agility's useless, without coordination you speed is uncontrolled.

Size, usually has to do with a combination of mass and reach.
Mass is how big the creature is, the more mass you have to deal with, usually means the transversal of the enemy's space or thier threatened area is larger and you need more time to get through it.
Reach is significant. In what little boxing I got to partake in, a reach advantage of 3" was a difficult thing to fight against. In Pathfinder we're usually talking about a reach difference measured in 5's of feet.
Now you're spot about moveing through a square. Once somehitn is 3 times larger than you on the game scales, it's often easier to just go under it than go over/through it.

Circumstance bonuses are circumstancial. Are you fighting on a ship? Is it storming out? Is the ship on fire? Are you on fire? Is the enemy made of fire? Are you trying to tumble across lava to avoid an enemy?
I use these as they are they came up in my last few games.

Insight, now this is some special knowledge or training. You either know the enemy like the back of your hand, you know the fighting style you're dealing with, or you have some other hidden knowledge of what you're doing.

Morale, the better you feel, the better you can do. The inverse is also true.
This works both on an individual and on a group scale.

Sacred/Profane bonuses usually mean something powerful wants you to succeed and is pulling strings to help you out. Both are at the same time dimetrically opposite and identical.

Luck usually means the universe likes you. Some how everything comes out your way, no matter what.

All that combines into a single stat, CMD. A general abstact rating on how had you are to deal with when you're trying to pull off something tricky.


And from my experience, in Capoeira, how well you fight with a sword, or throw a kick has next to nothing to do with preventing someone from tumbling around you. That relies on stance, footing, agility, your own ability to read the other person's motion (basically, by knowing the tricks yourself), and so forth. Being bigger is great for threatening at a further reach, but your senses and field of vision are no greater just by being bigger; having a wider area to guard makes it harder to keep someone from slipping past.

You do know that in learning to fight with a sword and throw a kick, you learn stance footing how to use agility and the sense of motion, etc. So yes it can help. Do you need specific training against tumblers? Possibly if you want an advantage, but you can still defend yourself from getting run past or through without that special training.






I dispute it's more realistic. And the game is completely unrealistic anyway, and trying to hold noncasters to "realim" past like 5th level means you're making it a personal goal for them to suck and be worthless in a world of magic.
Opposing it w/ a BAB-based stat, which comes for free from levelling up and may or may not include any training at all to counter a tumbler, instead of a skill check, is unfair and silly.
Probably should have used the phrase Organic than Realistic. Realism is silly in a fantasy based game, but it's the basis from which we the players deal with everything else.
You don't get BAB for 'free' from leveling. It's a measure of how dangerous you are. The more dangerous you are, the harder it should be to bypass you.
A raging dragon should not be as easy to bypass as a goblin with a yoyo.





Tumble was not ridiculous in 3E, and your claims of "ease," especially in full plate (huge check penalties) are curious. "Easy" at what level, exactly? Even if none of the myriad of possible DC increases applies, DC 15 is not automatic until at least 5th level, more likely ~8th level. While casters can fly and teleport well before this and don't even have "skirmishing" or "tactical mobility" as one of their assumed primary schticks.

It was ridiculous enough that my Dwarf in Fullplate did in fact perform it regularly. Getting bonuses were easy as he was trained in Jump, the Fullplate was Mithril and he had training which let him ignore some of the rest of the penalties. His high dex, feats and skill training/synergy left him with a wopping (Feats 5, Skill 4, Synergy 2, Dex 3, Bloodline 2, Armor Pen -2)=14 in tumble. He also had a ridiculous amount of Jump and used it to bypass foes entirely.




And on that topic, if 3E tumble was "ridiculous," why are you not complaining about PF's various SPELLS that let you automatically avoid AoOs for moving. The best "skirmisher" in PF is a Magus, true fact. Bladed Dash (level 2 spell, available at 4th level, earlier than auto-tumble in 3E is) + Spell Combat = the ability to flawlessly skirmish with a full attack plus an extra attack for good measure! How come that is "ok," but the poor rogue or monk merely trying to attack once and safely move is broken?

But fine. You don't like the actual skirmishing classes being the best...or even 5th best at actually skirmishing? Fine. Give them full BAB, higher HD, and better combat class features to make up for it. The whole deal in 3E was, "yeah, they can't hang in melee, but at least they can choose to drop in or out as they please." You want to take *that* away, you don't want them to have spells... give them something so they're not squishy anymore. For ****'s sake....

Where have I said I don't like skirmishing classes?
I've enjoyed the rogues and monks I've played. But I've never once relied on a single individual skill to perform what I want to do in combat.
More often than not I could get what I wanted from another non-random source, especially since my DM uses critical skill failures.
Both Rogues and Monks can get skirmishing advantages from feats and archetypes.
Spring Attack can be used when dealing with a single target. Gliding Steps can also help depending on how enemies are placed (And Yes, Rogues can gain a Ki Pool through rogue talents) and your movement types(Which you can add to). Both options need Dodge and Mobility, which as a skirmisher you should be taking anyway, the other feat for Gliding Steps, Nimble Moves allows you to 5 foot step in difficult terrain instead of having to use Acrobatics. There are also feats like Gang Up which let you flank as long as 2 other characters threaten the enemy, so you don't have to dive deep to get a flank if you don't want to.
There's a host of other options available as well. I've mentioned a bunch in my other posts.

Bladed Dash is only good if you are in position to use it, as you can't turn, if you have no valid movement, you fail and you suffer from two weapon fighting penalties for all attacks that round. Plus there's the concentration check, which will take 8-10 levels to make it always pass and the fact that you are using a 2nd level slot, so you're only going to be using it 2-3 times a day most likely. It's fairly limited.

[Blisstake]

Wow. Buckets of hate for Pathfinder. I'm surprised you guys read it if you hate it so much.

Well, the rules are free to look up, as well as all the material in their supplments, making it easy to stay on top of what's been added to the game. And it's also pretty common for something (anything, really) that gains a lot of popularity to have more, ah, vocal opponents keeping track of what it does:

Why does this system get popular, when there are plenty of better systems out there? I could have made a better game system one-handed after a monkey gives me a lobotomy! Paizo put no effort into this system and just reaped the money because it's similar to 3rd edition! I mean, what were they thinking with [feat] and the changes to [spell]? A real system expert would [balance stuff] instead of [bad balance stuff] like Paizo

Anyway, regarding the tier system, while it's pretty much as accurate as it gets, it doesn't account for all parameters of balance. It's mostly an account of the various classes viability in a gaming group; the more situations the character is good in, the better. It doesn't account for all levels of optimization (for example, in a group of all new players, a class like warblade might actually end up a lot more powerful than a wizard - I think a good system should account for all player levels to maintain a healthy player base.)

The tier system doesn't always capture differences in pure power as well. For example, even if a class got +1,000 to hit and damage as a class feature at level one, if that's all it had, it probably wouldn't go past tier 4. Does that mean it's more balanced than a tier 1 class like wizard? Eh... not exactly. It's definitely less versatile, but it would probably cause far more problems for any given player group that a wizard would. So even though the extra bonuses to hit and damage actually make a significat difference to the combat potential of a fighter in my gaming group, it doesn't actually improve their versatility very much, so they don't move much on the tier list. The tier list also doesn't care that metamagic stacking, polymorph abuse, celerity, and many extremely powerful supplment spells don't exist any more: the wizard in the hands of an experienced player is still incredibly versatile due to their amazing selection of spells, even if a few of the powerful ones were reduced in power. So they're still tier 1, even if, say, the changes to polymorph really helped out a particular group who wanted the wizards to stop being better at physically attacking enemies than the fighter.

Those are my experiences on the system anyway, but as always, it really depends on the group using it. Pathfinder has made huge improvements from 3.5 D&D in my gaming group, but certain groups (typically the more optimized ones) will really be against a lot of the changes being made by Pathfinder, as it doesn't solve the problems that show up in their group. I feel the development team has a better grasp on game balance than people realize... they just aim their changes at the problems less experienced and/or casual players have, rather than the optimized ones. That's probably a much bigger market, anyway, and would explain its success.

[JoshuaZ]

Wow. Buckets of hate for Pathfinder. I'm surprised you guys read it if you hate it so much.

I think a lot of people in this thread probably fall into the same category as I do: We like Pathfinder. We think it is more balanced, more fun, and in many ways easier to play than 3.5. But that doesn't make it very balanced, and it is disappointing in that they could have done a better job with balance, especially in regards to melee classes. That's not hatred at all: that's liking the system enough to care about where it has issues.

[White_Drake]

I believe that Pathfinder's biggest crimes against the Rogue are the Archaeologist Bard and the Vivisectionist Alchemist, because they reduced the Rogue to obsolescence.

Oh also, Tumskunde, you're saying that because your character was able to use Tumble effectively, because he invested a great deal of resources into being able to tumble effectively, Tumble was ridiculous?

[Tholomyes]

Essentially my take on it, is it's based on 3.5 rules, so It's not going to be balanced. It's not even going to be close to being balanced. But what it did for non-casters is make them more fun to play, by giving them more options either through Archetypes, or the simplified CMB/CMD mechanic, which allows a fighter, for example, to on a whim, decide he wants to do something that's not "Smack them with a sword" and rely on play to stall while the DM looks up the rules on it, or make up a rule which introduces an unknown element (the ability of a DM to adjuticate the maneuver in a balanced way). It didn't necessarily balance everything, mathematically, but it (in my opinion) balanced the gap of "how fun they are to play" between casters and non-casters. Fighters still may pale in comparison to Wizards in Pathfinder, but I've had more fun playing a fighter in Pathfinder than I ever did in 3.5.

[Sylthia]

Pathfinder is not truly balanced, but it fixed a lot of the problems. Polymorph cheese was fixed and martial classes got nice buffs. More things can be sneak attacked now, so it's helped rogues out.

There's also a nice rogue talent that lets you take 10 on certain skills during combat, which helps quite a bit with tumble checks or it you want to use wands or scrolls in combat.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

There's also a nice rogue talent that lets you take 10 on certain skills during combat, which helps quite a bit with tumble checks or it you want to use wands or scrolls in combat.

This isn't a PF "innovation," actually; it's taken almost verbatim from the 3e rogue description ("almost" because the PF version uses "confident" where the 3e version uses "certain," but the rest is word-for-word).

[Squirrel_Dude]

Tiers 1s are slightly less versatile, and tier bottoms are slightly more versatile, but it's not enough to keep the fighter from feeling like one of the wizards summoned creatures at high levels.

"Now you wait there while I cast 3 spells, and then move in to attack. Good boy!"

[3WhiteFox3]

Tiers 1s are slightly less versatile, and tier bottoms are slightly more versatile, but it's not enough to keep the fighter from feeling like one of the wizards summoned creatures at high levels.

"Now you wait there while I cast 3 spells, and then move in to attack. Good boy!"

My Conjuration (Teleportation) Wizard has to disagree with you. They have constantly given the Tier 1s more and more goodies, while taking away the few nice things that the mundane classes had. Mundanes have no equivalent to ToB, many of the feats that made melee usable don't exist or were harshly nerfed, so non-magical melee characters lack very little presence in the system past tier 4. None of the purely mundane classes gained so much as to move them in tier, and several of them were actually nerfed in ways. (Some of the fighters better feats were nerfed, monks were given nerfs to their unarmed attacks.)

Casters on the other hand get awesome traits like Lore Seeker and Magical Lineage. Feats like Dazing Spell and Spell Perfection. The Teleportation school replacement ability gives Wizards Swift Action teleportation with 3+Int mod uses per day (more if you're an elf). Clerics are borderline NAD (Non Ability Dependent) since the best clerics are now mainly passive thus a high Wisdom isn't as important for spell DCs and since Turn Undead was butchered into Channel Energy, there is little reason for not dumping Charisma. Druids got nerfed, as did polymorph; but that just means that battlefield control and party buffing became more necessary than ever. Sorcerers are better than ever thanks to the Arcane Bloodline and Human Favored Class bonuses. The Oracle is similarly awesome, Witches have at-will debuffs that can change encounters, etc...

However, one of the worst offenders is the Summoner. A well-built summoner can aptly sub in for the entire party. Summons are often as good, if not better than melee classes, the Eidolon can be turned into a party scout and skill monkey that makes the rogue completely obsolete, they have serviceable support casting and with their high Charisma they operate as party faces; topping all of this off is UMD, to make up for anything they couldn't do. On top of that, they are nearly fool-proof. At worst they have an expendable melee beatstick, summons for when things go south, a high Charisma for party face work, and some great buffs earlier than the full casters get them. Summoners may still be spontaneous casters stuck in tier 2, however, they seem to have been built from the ground-up to completely overshadow every mundane character.

Note: I love pathfinder, I enjoy the game immensely; however, balanced it is not. For every good decision that PF made, it also gave us at least one bad one, in terms of balance.

[StreamOfTheSky]

But what it did for non-casters is make them more fun to play, by giving them more options either through Archetypes, or the simplified CMB/CMD mechanic, which allows a fighter, for example, to on a whim, decide he wants to do something that's not "Smack them with a sword" and rely on play to stall while the DM looks up the rules on it, or make up a rule which introduces an unknown element (the ability of a DM to adjuticate the maneuver in a balanced way). It didn't necessarily balance everything, mathematically, but it (in my opinion) balanced the gap of "how fun they are to play" between casters and non-casters. Fighters still may pale in comparison to Wizards in Pathfinder, but I've had more fun playing a fighter in Pathfinder than I ever did in 3.5.


Pathfinder is not truly balanced, but it fixed a lot of the problems. Polymorph cheese was fixed and martial classes got nice buffs. More things can be sneak attacked now, so it's helped rogues out.

There's also a nice rogue talent that lets you take 10 on certain skills during combat, which helps quite a bit with tumble checks or it you want to use wands or scrolls in combat.

I just... ugh.... I'm sick of citing facts and giving mechanical explanations only for people to just make the same wrong claims over and over...

Nothing is going to convince PF fans that rogues got nerfed, or maneuvers are harder now thus making martials less interesting, and so forth. Or that casters were not actually "nerfed" even slightly... I'm sick of banging my head against a brick wall. :smallannoyed:

[3WhiteFox3]

I just... ugh.... I'm sick of citing facts and giving mechanical explanations only for people to just make the same wrong claims over and over...

Nothing is going to convince PF fans that rogues got nerfed, or maneuvers are harder now thus making martials less interesting, and so forth. Or that casters were not actually "nerfed" even slightly... I'm sick of banging my head against a brick wall. :smallannoyed:

I can see people not understanding why Rogues were actually hurt, and even why they think that maneuvers weren't completely ruined. However, I don't understand why anyone would claim that casters are more balanced. A few things may have been tweaked, but in the end they were either meaningless or actually beneficial to casters. Just look at all of the goodies that magic got in every book published so far. (Yup, including the book supposedly written with melee in mind.)

[Reverent-One]

I just... ugh.... I'm sick of citing facts and giving mechanical explanations only for people to just make the same wrong claims over and over...

Nothing is going to convince PF fans that rogues got nerfed, or maneuvers are harder now thus making martials less interesting, and so forth. Or that casters were not actually "nerfed" even slightly... I'm sick of banging my head against a brick wall. :smallannoyed:

It's almost like people have their own experiences to the contrary or something. Crazy.

Seriously though, pathfinder affected different groups differently. If the rogues didn't often use splash weapons, they don't notice that change, but do likely notice how they're sneak attacking against more creatures; if they don't optimize their spell casters a lot, they may miss certain combos that now exist, but see the weakening of key standbys like glitterdust or grease; depending on level and what sort of enemies you're fighting maneuvers actually end up working out better for them, ect and so on.

[StreamOfTheSky]

I can see people not understanding why Rogues were actually hurt, and even why they think that maneuvers weren't completely ruined. However, I don't understand why anyone would claim that casters are more balanced. A few things may have been tweaked, but in the end they were either meaningless or actually beneficial to casters. Just look at all of the goodies that magic got in every book published so far. (Yup, including the book supposedly written with melee in mind.)

I honestly think the reason is because paizo staff and many of their fans repeatedly say things like, "Pathfinder fixed a lot of problems with 3E, it still didn't fix everything, of course..." and people read it over and over and just start believing it. The latter part is important, it makes the statement seem more reasonable and balanced/unbiased, even if the first part of the statement is completely false.

[JoshuaZ]

I honestly think the reason is because paizo staff and many of their fans repeatedly say things like, "Pathfinder fixed a lot of problems with 3E, it still didn't fix everything, of course..." and people read it over and over and just start believing it. The latter part is important, it makes the statement seem more reasonable and balanced/unbiased, even if the first part of the statement is completely false.

The statement is actually true. They did fix dead levels in general. They made monks not suck. And they made a number of spells a lot more sane or just hateful (e.g. Grease, Disjunction). They streamlined combat and the skill system. They didn't fix everything, or for that matter fix nearly as much as they could/should have (in part it looks like the designers didn't have much real understanding of optimization and how extreme the difference in Tiers can get).

Also they introduced a substantial number of new problems. Specialist wizards having some access to their opposed schools bumps them even higher on T1. Removing XP as something you can pay limits a lot of nice mechanics and interferes with a fair bit of backwards compatibility. And they actively nerfed some fighter feats for reasons that are probably only explained in books which also reveal how to summon the Great Old Ones.

But overall, I'd say it is still an improvement and more balanced than 3.5.

[Sylthia]

I honestly think the reason is because paizo staff and many of their fans repeatedly say things like, "Pathfinder fixed a lot of problems with 3E, it still didn't fix everything, of course..." and people read it over and over and just start believing it. The latter part is important, it makes the statement seem more reasonable and balanced/unbiased, even if the first part of the statement is completely false.

I understand your stance, and for super-optimization, the math probably works out that way, but rogues in PF core get more toys without having to go into splats and such like in 3.5. The consolidation of skills helps rogues actually branch out a bit with their skills, rather than have to spend all 8 or so of their skill points just to be able to do what's expected of them.

Rogues being made obsolete by other classes like the summoner is more a problem with the summoner than with the rogue itself.

For things such as the feat that nullifies flanking and sneak attack, as a DM, I wouldn't be using that for my enemy NPCs. The fact that it exists doesn't mean it has to be used.

Being able to sneak attack undead and constructs is a definite plus for rogues.

Martial classes still need help in general and I have no delusions about that. I have a few house-rule fixes for that in my current campaign.

[StreamOfTheSky]

The statement is actually true. They did fix dead levels in general.

Getting Bravery +X at a given level is not "fixing" dead levels to me. I'd rather go a dead level if the one after it had something actually really good, than get strung out with a bunch of weak worthless garbage. It's a purely cosmetic change.


They made monks not suck.

They made monks suck more, and I can't believe you actually said this.


And they made a number of spells a lot more sane or just hateful (e.g. Grease, Disjunction).

Fair point on Disjunction, Grease is actually buffed (10x the duration) for anyone who isn't a rogue. Fixing some spells doesn't really matter if other spells (and ones they add later on!) are still broken. As long as a caster has win spells at each level, the number of choices doesn't really matter that much. Hell, Dazing Spell feat alone gave casters the ability to turn any damage spell into a win spell and choose what save to attack!


They streamlined combat and the skill system. They didn't fix everything, or for that matter fix nearly as much as they could/should have (in part it looks like the designers didn't have much real understanding of optimization and how extreme the difference in Tiers can get).

They streamlined combat maneuvers into not working by making them really hard to pull off and making them cost more feats and take longer to acquire said feats to do what you could do at level 1 in 3E. The skill system is simpler, but the way they did it obsoleted the Rogue.


Also they introduced a substantial number of new problems. Specialist wizards having some access to their opposed schools bumps them even higher on T1. Removing XP as something you can pay limits a lot of nice mechanics and interferes with a fair bit of backwards compatibility. And they actively nerfed some fighter feats for reasons that are probably only explained in books which also reveal how to summon the Great Old Ones.

Completely agree with all of this. Removing XP costs was a nice buff for casters; crafting feats now are just straight up doubling your wealth. Granted, casters will usually use the feats to help the entire party. But a Fighter than can one-hit kill any monster helps the whole party, too. He's still the one being the badass.


But overall, I'd say it is still an improvement and more balanced than 3.5.

No.

[StreamOfTheSky]

I understand your stance, and for super-optimization, the math probably works out that way, but rogues in PF core get more toys without having to go into splats and such like in 3.5. The consolidation of skills helps rogues actually branch out a bit with their skills, rather than have to spend all 8 or so of their skill points just to be able to do what's expected of them.

No, the math works no matter what level of optimization. Unless you're intentionally gimping yourself. A druid even played by a newbie, is likely going to have wisdom highest and max out perception. And thus will be at least as good as a rogue at finding traps by complete accident, for example.

The consolidation of skills and erosion of class skill as a boon means rogues have little purpose any more. He might be able to be "pretty good" at a lot of skills. But a balanced party can cover all the skills between themselves anyway and will be better than the rogue at their own specialties. A Sorcerer will be a better bluffer and UMD user, for instance. D&D has always heavily rewarded specialization, and efficient use of differently skilled individuals is the hall mark of a great team, so being a jack of all trades, master of none is not something to aspire to.


Rogues being made obsolete by other classes like the summoner is more a problem with the summoner than with the rogue itself.

No, ultimately the problem is that the 3E Rogue was built on the foundation of niche protection. It wasn't about what they could do so much as what they could do that nearly no one else even could do. You take that away, you need to address that problem. With the rogue class. There are literally at least half a dozen classes that obsolete the rogue as a skill monkey, the problem is clearly with the rogue, or the skill system itself, whichever you'd rather change.


For things such as the feat that nullifies flanking and sneak attack, as a DM, I wouldn't be using that for my enemy NPCs. The fact that it exists doesn't mean it has to be used.

The fact that it exists means anyone playing a PF Rogue has to hope they get a DM as nice as you. The fact that it exists speaks volumes about what paizo thinks of rogues.


Being able to sneak attack undead and constructs is a definite plus for rogues.

If only they could do it from range reliably... I'd rather be awesome half the time than below average full time, maybe it's just my preference... And seriously, it is not fair to compare core 3E to core PF, PF had nearly a DECADE to learn from 3E's mistakes. 3E learned from its mistakes and put out a ton of ways to SA various creatures, that PF maintained that status quo is nothing praise worthy.

[Sylthia]

If only they could do it from range reliably... I'd rather be awesome half the time than below average full time, maybe it's just my preference... And seriously, it is not fair to compare core 3E to core PF, PF had nearly a DECADE to learn from 3E's mistakes. 3E learned from its mistakes and put out a ton of ways to SA various creatures, that PF maintained that status quo is nothing praise worthy.

I agree with letting rogues sneak attack at range more easily. I compare PF core with 3.X core, because after several years, it's difficult to keep track the myriad supplements that were released for 3.5.

For years, me and my friends pretty much used the big 3 for books, with some homebrew thrown in here and there.

[StreamOfTheSky]

Well, PF nerfed basically every means of full attacking with sneak attacks from range. In 3E, it was as simple as a ring of blinking. In PF, it's basically greater invisibility or nothing, and hope the monster doesn't have an ability to see invisible foes.

[Squirrel_Dude]

My Conjuration (Teleportation) Wizard has to disagree with you. They have constantly given the Tier 1s more and more goodies, while taking away the few nice things that the mundane classes had. Mundanes have no equivalent to ToB, many of the feats that made melee usable don't exist or were harshly nerfed, so non-magical melee characters lack very little presence in the system past tier 4. None of the purely mundane classes gained so much as to move them in tier, and several of them were actually nerfed in ways. (Some of the fighters better feats were nerfed, monks were given nerfs to their unarmed attacks.)I would argue that ToB isn't even mundane in the first place. I love it, make no mistake, but it's nonetheless quite clearly a separate magic system for melee combatants. I would also say that when we think of fighters in D&D 3.5, we're often just thinking of the ubercharger or other super-high-powered builds.

Pathfinder's biggest sin and blessing might be that many of those builds are removed from the game. This is partly because of the greater weaknesses of multiclassing and prestige classing. Mundanes simply have trouble keeping up. They're able to have many more tricks, but they often aren't as strong.

I just think they are slightly better at keeping up, and that the Tier 1's have slightly more trouble replacing them.


Casters on the other hand get awesome traits like Lore Seeker and Magical Lineage. Feats like Dazing Spell and Spell Perfection. The Teleportation school replacement ability gives Wizards Swift Action teleportation with 3+Int mod uses per day (more if you're an elf). Clerics are borderline NAD (Non Ability Dependent) since the best clerics are now mainly passive thus a high Wisdom isn't as important for spell DCs and since Turn Undead was butchered into Channel Energy, there is little reason for not dumping Charisma. Druids got nerfed, as did polymorph; but that just means that battlefield control and party buffing became more necessary than ever. Sorcerers are better than ever thanks to the Arcane Bloodline and Human Favored Class bonuses. The Oracle is similarly awesome, Witches have at-will debuffs that can change encounters, etc...Not really a change from 3.5. I still think there are slightly fewer tools for them to use. I think Clerics are actually more MAD, and that they've been forced to become more passive. Inquisitors and Oracles can overshadow them in combat, but they overshadow them in casting. CoDzilla simply isn't a viable option anymore. You will be overshadowed by another character, even a Samurai.


However, one of the worst offenders is the Summoner. A well-built summoner can aptly sub in for the entire party. Summons are often as good, if not better than melee classes, the Eidolon can be turned into a party scout and skill monkey that makes the rogue completely obsolete, they have serviceable support casting and with their high Charisma they operate as party faces; topping all of this off is UMD, to make up for anything they couldn't do. On top of that, they are nearly fool-proof. At worst they have an expendable melee beatstick, summons for when things go south, a high Charisma for party face work, and some great buffs earlier than the full casters get them. Summoners may still be spontaneous casters stuck in tier 2, however, they seem to have been built from the ground-up to completely overshadow every mundane character.Yeah, I'm not a fan of the summoner. Especially the Synthesist.

[StreamOfTheSky]

The synthesis is the least powerful archetype of summoner (except maybe first world...man, that one sucks...). Other summoners can cast no SR conjurations *and* have a "better than fighter" up front wrecking face. A synthesis can only do one of those two things at a time. Action economy, man.

Synthesist gets the most hate because the eidolon is so blatantly better than the actual martial classes and synthesis means a) it's a bit more powerful still due to the fusion and b) it's the actual PC doing the Fighter-replacing, which for some reason seems to bother people more than when it's just his pet class feature doing it.


It really is crazy, though... So many people complained that 3E animal companion could replace a fighter or even was better than one (I completely disagree, fighter was definitely better past level 1)... and then paizo puts out this eidolon class feature who makes the 3E animal companion look like a PF monk by comparison... and those same people lap it up! WTF?

[Squirrel_Dude]

The synthesis is the least powerful archetype of summoner (except maybe first world...man, that one sucks...). Other summoners can cast no SR conjurations *and* have a "better than fighter" up front wrecking face. A synthesis can only do one of those two things at a time. Action economy, man.

Synthesist gets the most hate because the eidolon is so blatantly better than the actual martial classes and synthesis means a) it's a bit more powerful still due to the fusion and b) it's the actual PC doing the Fighter-replacing, which for some reason seems to bother people more than when it's just his pet class feature doing it.


It really is crazy, though... So many people complained that 3E animal companion could replace a fighter or even was better than one (I completely disagree, fighter was definitely better past level 1)... and then paizo puts out this eidolon class feature who makes the 3E animal companion look like a PF monk by comparison... and those same people lap it up! WTF?*shrug*

I don't think I'm alone in saying that I have cooled to the changes Pathfinder has made as the game went along. There have been some good changes, but the line between very good to overpowered for arcane casters has always been so thin that it didn't take many slip ups.

That's not to think that there aren't many good ideas. I like the inquisitor. I like the Oracle. I like the new Paladin and Ranger. I like the new skill system.

I guess I'll just wait for the next miracle cure to 3.5

[JoshuaZ]

Getting Bravery +X at a given level is not "fixing" dead levels to me. I'd rather go a dead level if the one after it had something actually really good, than get strung out with a bunch of weak worthless garbage. It's a purely cosmetic change.


This seems more like a stylistic claim. Part of the problem here might be that most spellcasters are getting so much at a level, they a few +Xs doesn't look like much.



They made monks suck more, and I can't believe you actually said this.


Can you expand on your logic here? The ki system gives them a variety of options that 3.5 monks would otherwise lack.



Fair point on Disjunction, Grease is actually buffed (10x the duration) for anyone who isn't a rogue.

In combat, duration of grease rarely matters. And the changes to the skill system (with acrobatics as a single thing) along with the other changes make it much easier to deal with Grease.



Fixing some spells doesn't really matter if other spells (and ones they add later on!) are still broken.

Fewer broken spells is better overall I would think. And the added spells are rarely more broken.



As long as a caster has win spells at each level, the number of choices doesn't really matter that much. Hell, Dazing Spell feat alone gave casters the ability to turn any damage spell into a win spell and choose what save to attack!

I agree that dazing spell is problematic. But most of this falls into the "they could have done a better job balancing the spells" but that they didn't do that perfectly isn't an argument against it.




They streamlined combat maneuvers into not working by making them really hard to pull off and making them cost more feats and take longer to acquire said feats to do what you could do at level 1 in 3E.

You get more feats in PF than you do in 3.5.



The skill system is simpler, but the way they did it obsoleted the Rogue.

Not really. Other people have a slight chance of doing the same things that a rogue used to be able to do. But the rogue will still be a better skill monkey, and the rogue's other bonuses are quite nice.

[StreamOfTheSky]

This seems more like a stylistic claim. Part of the problem here might be that most spellcasters are getting so much at a level, they a few +Xs doesn't look like much..

Actually, worrying about "dead levels" at all is the stylistic concern. If a class gets many potent, interesting class features spread out over 20 levels, it doesn't really matter in terms of class balance if some of the specific levels are blank. Adding in stupid little insignificant bonuses just to get rid of white space is being concerned with style over substance.


Can you expand on your logic here? The ki system gives them a variety of options that 3.5 monks would otherwise lack.

I already did....on like the very first page...


In combat, duration of grease rarely matters. And the changes to the skill system (with acrobatics as a single thing) along with the other changes make it much easier to deal with Grease..

It matters at level 1. I seldom took grease at level 1 in 3E, the 1 round duration was just too limiting. No worries in PF, though. It's a better spell at low levels, it gets worse (but still damn useful for utility and just the sheer difficult terrain it adds) at later levels, compared to 3E. For a 1st level offensive spell, I care far more about performance at the lower levels.


And the added spells are rarely more broken.

Uh...they've added several save or loses, and lots of other powerful options. I rather like the 9th level spell that lets you create your own demiplane and choose the rate time flows in it, for example.


I agree that dazing spell is problematic. But most of this falls into the "they could have done a better job balancing the spells" but that they didn't do that perfectly isn't an argument against it.

No. Stop it with the "aww shucks...." stuff. You're just Flanderizing the issue. Any person with half a brain could look at dazing spell and instantly realize how much power spellcasters just gained. Ditto for wizards and their prohibited school casting. Ditto for lots of other caster things. PF has deliberately and noticeably been buffing casters right from core and continuing on with each splat book, far more than the buffs (if any) the noncasters have gotten or are getting.


You get more feats in PF than you do in 3.5..

And martials have to pay more feats to do the same things they could in 3E, particularly for combat maneuvers. Caster feats were not split up meanwhile. So for casters there are more feats, for martials, it was a bait and switch.
Also, until level 5, you don't actually have more feats. Then next level you again don't have more feats and it isn't until level 7 where you completely pull ahead compared to 3E. That is really important to note because a) A lot of people barely get to level 7+ and b) if your 3E game allowed flaws, you actually have less feats in PF until the double digit levels.


Not really. Other people have a slight chance of doing the same things that a rogue used to be able to do. But the rogue will still be a better skill monkey, and the rogue's other bonuses are quite nice.

That's completely incorrect. A +3 bonus. That is the only difference a rogue has over someone without the skill in class. That's it. A caster using skills based on his casting stat EASILY surpasses that deficit. "Class skill" is also cheap and easy to gain via traits or just dipping a level. It's a joke now. What other bonuses? You can't even use rogue talents to take skill focus, just a bunch of bs "reroll this skill check once per day" crap. Which other classes can still do better with, like a Dual-Cursed Oracle with Misfortune (despite the name, it can actually be quite...fortunate for self and allies).
The best skill monkey in PF, aside from the whole "spells obsolete you" deal is a bard. His Versatile Performance means he has equal skill points to a rogue by level 6 and surpasses him at 10+ ...and that's with the viewpoint that the ranks in perform skills themselves are a "waste." He gets big boons on knowledge checks, then later on he can use any skill untrained and at high levels can take 10 on ALL skills. Not 3 + int. ALL. And then he has spells and performances like Charm Person, Glibness, and Suggestion to supplement the skills. And he can use performance to make other people better at skills.

[Blisstake]

I just... ugh.... I'm sick of citing facts and giving mechanical explanations only for people to just make the same wrong claims over and over...

Nothing is going to convince PF fans that rogues got nerfed, or maneuvers are harder now thus making martials less interesting, and so forth. Or that casters were not actually "nerfed" even slightly... I'm sick of banging my head against a brick wall. :smallannoyed:

Again, this all depends on how your group plays. For the majority of people I've gamed with, the PF rogue is a definite improvement, as the areas where the 3.5 rogue was superior were not really obvious to my players. However, if you know all the sneak attack cominations with the best items, ACFs, class dips, feats, and other things, a 3.5 rogue could reliably get full-attack sneak attacks against a larger variety of targets. I'll fully admit that to a person with a strong system mastery could produce a much more powerful 3.5 rogue than PF rogue, but I don't think that means it's a better class, far from it.

Not everyone plays the same (there's no right way to play D&D), and the sooner people realize this, the less head banging we'll see. The reason Pathfinder gets my attention is because I find it great for new players, and requires less system mastery to make a character that's playable, making it a lot easier to get groups of varying degrees of familiarity with the system.

[StreamOfTheSky]

What about when those same newbies merely attempt to dutifully tumble into a flank for a sneak attack? The tumble nerf surely hurts them there, doesn't it? Or think they'll be the skill monkey and party face, only to realize the sorcerer is better at bluff and diplomacy than them? Or think they'll help the party out by finding the traps, then someone eventually asks if they can also try to look and the DM says, "yeah, in PF anyone can find any trap"?

Maybe they never played 3E and don't actually realize things did not use to be this way. It's still affecting them, even outside of optimization stuff, just attempting to do the things the class fluff says they're supposed to do.

[Urpriest]

What about when those same newbies merely attempt to dutifully tumble into a flank for a sneak attack? The tumble nerf surely hurts them there, doesn't it? Or think they'll be the skill monkey and party face, only to realize the sorcerer is better at bluff and diplomacy than them? Or think they'll help the party out by finding the traps, then someone eventually asks if they can also try to look and the DM says, "yeah, in PF anyone can find any trap"?

Maybe they never played 3E and don't actually realize things did not use to be this way. It's still affecting them, even outside of optimization stuff, just attempting to do the things the class fluff says they're supposed to do.

The rest is valid, but this was true in 3.5 too. The Sorceror was always better at Bluff than the Rogue, while the Cleric and Paladin were better at Diplomacy. Rogues certainly could be party faces, but only in the absence of Cha-focused characters.

[Chained Birds]

I (at least) like that a rogue can SA a golem or undead, and the Shadow Strike feat does do a nice job negating the no precision damage with stuff like concealment. I'm not saying that there are no ways to do this in 3.5 (I don't know, but there probably is), but I personally believe this feature makes PF rogues superior. There is also the HD boost so they can sorta take a hit.
Also, Rogues do have access to a Talent that gives them a Spell-like ability (Acid Splash or Ray of Frost for example) that can make them pretty good a dealing alternative damage to a creature. Or did 3.5 rogues have the ability to SA all enemies in a Splash Weapon's radius at the same time? That sounds kind of weird unless you are an Arcane Trickster or something...

I don't know, I just never saw the Rogue as much of a Party Face past the fact they had Diplomacy on their skill list among other things. They are really too MAD of a class to put too much focus on social skills, and are greatly outshines by most Charisma focused characters. This is true for both PF and 3.5.

At least most people agree that PF Paladin was greatly improved.

[137beth]

Uh...they've added several save or loses, and lots of other powerful options. I rather like the 9th level spell that lets you create your own demiplane and choose the rate time flows in it, for example.
This was in 3E too... (ELH, but it was a nonepic 9th level spell). Actually, the 3E version is in some ways better, since it cannot be dispelled (In 3E, the duration is instantaneous. In PF, it has limited duration, unless you cast permanency, in which case it can still be destroyed by (greater) dispel magic). Also, the plane's volume in PF is 20000*CL cubic feet, while in 3E it has a radius of 180 ft (volume approximately 2.4*10^7 cubic feet, more than 60 times larger than the PF version at level 20). On top of that, additional castings in PF increase the volume linearly per casting (and you need additional permanencies AND it can all be dispelled) while repeatedly casting the 3E version increases the volume cubically. So actually, PF nerfed this quite a bit.

I agree with most of the other things you said, but really? Create demi-plane is not broken in any sense of the word.

[navar100]

This was in 3E too... (ELH, but it was a nonepic 9th level spell). Actually, the 3E version is in some ways better, since it cannot be dispelled (In 3E, the duration is instantaneous. In PF, it has limited duration, unless you cast permanency, in which case it can still be destroyed by (greater) dispel magic). Also, the plane's volume in PF is 20000*CL cubic feet, while in 3E it has a radius of 180 ft (volume approximately 2.4*10^7 cubic feet, more than 60 times larger than the PF version at level 20). On top of that, additional castings in PF increase the volume linearly per casting (and you need additional permanencies AND it can all be dispelled) while repeatedly casting the 3E version increases the volume cubically. So actually, PF nerfed this quite a bit.

I agree with most of the other things you said, but really? Create demi-plane is not broken in any sense of the word.

Devil's advocate response, not personal opinion.

When people say Create Demiplane is broken, it has nothing to do with the physical dimensions or how long it lasts. It's the fact that you can alter the time trait, allowing you to have as much time as you want on your created plane but only a second goes by on the Material Plane allowing the spellcaster to do all sorts of shenanigans for as long as he needs.

[Reverent-One]

What about when those same newbies merely attempt to dutifully tumble into a flank for a sneak attack? The tumble nerf surely hurts them there, doesn't it? Or think they'll be the skill monkey and party face, only to realize the sorcerer is better at bluff and diplomacy than them? Or think they'll help the party out by finding the traps, then someone eventually asks if they can also try to look and the DM says, "yeah, in PF anyone can find any trap"?

Really, that someone else can help with the boring job of searching every square in a dungeon is a bad thing? It's really not an exciting part of the job, merely a requirement to fill. And if they do want to be good at searching for traps, Rogues have a talent that makes the process 10 times better, the Trap Spotter talent, allowing you to skip that boring search every square of the dungeon bit I just mentioned since they now get auto perception checks for traps.

[Squirrel_Dude]

Really, that someone else can help with the boring job of searching every square in a dungeon is a bad thing? It's really not an exciting part of the job, merely a requirement to fill. And if they do want to be good at searching for traps, Rogues have a talent that makes the process 10 times better, the Trap Spotter talent, allowing you to skip that boring search every square of the dungeon bit I just mentioned since they now get auto perception checks for traps.You've played with people who don't automatically search for traps whenever they enter a hallway, room, or broom closet?

[Reverent-One]

You've played with people who don't automatically search for traps whenever they enter a hallway, room, or broom closet?

Of course, that's the boring search every square bit I'm talking about. The rogue talent helps because you don't even need to take the time to say that and then roll for everything you come across, instead they only end up rolling if there is a trap.

[Tholomyes]

Of course, that's the boring search every square bit I'm talking about. The rogue talent helps because you don't even need to take the time to say that and then roll for everything you come across, instead they only end up rolling if there is a trap.

The problem with this is, I've never seen a DM who requires the rogue to "Search every Square". Why? Because it slows the game down. A single Perception Check is all that's needed, and move on. So it's basically a rogue talent that, in practice, does nothing. Honestly, I don't have a problem with the fact that the rogue is neigh-useless (which it is), because there are ways to do the same concept other ways (Archaeologist Bard comes to mind), and I'm fine with writing that off and calling it a rogue.

[Reverent-One]

The problem with this is, I've never seen a DM who requires the rogue to "Search every Square". Why? Because it slows the game down. A single Perception Check is all that's needed, and move on. So it's basically a rogue talent that, in practice, does nothing. Honestly, I don't have a problem with the fact that the rogue is neigh-useless (which it is), because there are ways to do the same concept other ways (Archaeologist Bard comes to mind), and I'm fine with writing that off and calling it a rogue.


Not everyone plays the same (there's no right way to play D&D), and the sooner people realize this, the less head banging we'll see.

Though despite the quote, one perception check to search the whole dungeon is certainly against RAW.

[Tholomyes]

Though despite the quote, one perception check to search the whole dungeon is certainly against RAW.

A)Not the Whole dungeon, but per Corridor, it's a perfectly reasonable way to keep the game from stalling for hours of trap checks

B)The RAW also suggest a lot of stupid things; there are entire threads on this. Part of the job of a DM is to look at the rules, and know where to say "This is stupid; here's how I'll adjudicate this."

[Reverent-One]

A)Not the Whole dungeon, but per Corridor, it's a perfectly reasonable way to keep the game from stalling for hours of trap checks

Still leaves the talent saving you unnecessary checks then. Less than if you're checking every X squares (where X is anywhere from 1 to the full length of the corridor), but still there. Plus there's every door you come across, chest you see, ect.

[olentu]

Still leaves the talent saving you unnecessary checks then. Less than if you're checking every X squares (where X is anywhere from 1 to the full length of the corridor), but still there. Plus there's every door you come across, chest you see, ect.

I'm sort of wondering why one would not be taking a 20 on that kind of thing regardless of the talent.

[137beth]

Devil's advocate response, not personal opinion.

When people say Create Demiplane is broken, it has nothing to do with the physical dimensions or how long it lasts. It's the fact that you can alter the time trait, allowing you to have as much time as you want on your created plane but only a second goes by on the Material Plane allowing the spellcaster to do all sorts of shenanigans for as long as he needs.

Well, yea:smalltongue:
I do think (greater) Create Demiplane is broken, but
a) it isn't really the most powerful thing you can do by those levels
b) the post I responded to was specifically complaining about how he though PF totally ruined things by giving casters even more broken spells, and he singled out greater create demiplane. I was pointing out that that same spell is in 3.5, and is at least as broken there.

[Snowbluff]

At least most people agree that PF Paladin was greatly improved.

I think 3.5 options for Paladin were better. Serenity and Battle Blessing are pretty sweet. Ubermount is really cool. Divine and Devotion feats are freaking sweet. They even had options to cast wizards spells.

[Reverent-One]

I'm sort of wondering why one would not be taking a 20 on that kind of thing regardless of the talent.

Time in-character can be an issue for buffs and such, dungeons have a tendency to be taxing on the party's endurance, not wasting time between fights can mean saving spells that may be needed later.

[Tholomyes]

Honestly, these 9th level spells are hardly what I'd use to justify balance or lack there of in PF. Campaigns, at least in my experience rarely get that far (the same reason I don't get optimizing to level 20). I tend to look at more mid-level stuff to really judge. It's kind of like the Great-Cleave Commoner Rapid Transport. Yeah theoretically it's stupid, but in actuality, you get only a couple swings off, max.

Now I still will agree even at mid-level range, Casters pull far ahead of non-casters, but it's not as ridiculous disparity as the 9th level spell examples make it out to be. I'm not trying to be a 3.x apologist. I don't like this disparity, but 4e's got it's own problems, and 5e looks like it's going to be the worst of both worlds, so like it or not, unless some new system comes out of nowhere and becomes the forefront Fantasy system, it's something that has to be settled with "What's the most preferable?" That's not the same for all groups, but at least for me, PF has provided a more enjoyable experience than 3.5 because it might not balance the power of the casters-vs-noncasters, but it lessens the difference in enjoyment.

[StreamOfTheSky]

Well, yea:smalltongue:
I do think (greater) Create Demiplane is broken, but
a) it isn't really the most powerful thing you can do by those levels
b) the post I responded to was specifically complaining about how he though PF totally ruined things by giving casters even more broken spells, and he singled out greater create demiplane. I was pointing out that that same spell is in 3.5, and is at least as broken there.

I'm aware of its existence in 3E as well. That's sort of why I chose it as an example. I didn't say PF casters have a larger quantity of broken spells than 3E ones. I said they still have enough and that PF is kind enough to keep adding more back in with the splats. That they specifically re-added a very potent high level spell to **** with time flow kind of shoots in the foot the claims that they took things away from casters, or so I thought...

[olentu]

Time in-character can be an issue for buffs and such, dungeons have a tendency to be taxing on the party's endurance, not wasting time between fights can mean saving spells that may be needed later.

This is true, but then again a low roll can just as easily TPK the party depending on the trap in question. Though one could speed up the process by standing 10 feet away from the item in question and then moving back and forth many times. Say 39 as a good measure. With a 30 foot speed we have 3 per round taking 13 rounds, though that does leave about a 13% chance of not having rolled a 20 if I have done the calculations correctly. I suppose saving 7 rounds is worth the risk.

[StreamOfTheSky]

As for trapfinding, it is perfectly legal to take 10 when not under pressure/threat, so I usually just tell the DM, "I'm taking 10, Search 25" or whatever and move on with my life. And I agree, it's a poor role and one I don't care for. It was still a niche protected for 3E rogues largely removed in PF. If you're going to take away all the niches of a class whose sole reason to be used was all their niche protections making them a required party member... you need to do something to make up for that or realize you've just obsoleted the class.

As for the d8 HD... EVERY class that was d6 or lower HD got bumped up, I don't think that's a huge change. More important is that the monsters in PF got beefed up quite a bit, between higher stats and the new rules giving many monsters a LOT of primary natural attacks instead of just 1 or 2. Melee is more dangerous than in 3E, and rogues (and monks) are weaker in combat and can't even reliably tumble to safety now.

[Reverent-One]

As for trapfinding, it is perfectly legal to take 10 when not under pressure/threat, so I usually just tell the DM, "I'm taking 10, Search 25" or whatever and move on with my life. And I agree, it's a poor role and one I don't care for. It was still a niche protected for 3E rogues largely removed in PF. If you're going to take away all the niches of a class whose sole reason to be used was all their niche protections making them a required party member... you need to do something to make up for that or realize you've just obsoleted the class.

Good thing they're still one of the best skill monkeys out there, their main combat ability got one of it's major (if not it's most major) limitations lessened, as well as getting all those rogue talents. Of course, I've said all this before, in this very thread even.

[Blisstake]

What about when those same newbies merely attempt to dutifully tumble into a flank for a sneak attack? The tumble nerf surely hurts them there, doesn't it? Or think they'll be the skill monkey and party face, only to realize the sorcerer is better at bluff and diplomacy than them? Or think they'll help the party out by finding the traps, then someone eventually asks if they can also try to look and the DM says, "yeah, in PF anyone can find any trap"?

Well, answering from my group's experience...

The tumble nerf isn't a huge deal, though I agree the numbers are off for it. Usually, though, it hasn't been too difficult for players to move around to flank a target in a way that doesn't provoke AoOs. Sometimes they'll also just take one attack without SA, but be in a position to full attack next round. And again, back in 3.5, this didn't even matter half the time, as players would often find themselves against undead or constructs or another one of the many enemies immune to sneak attacks.

As for diplomacy, rogues can end up just as good. They have far more skill points to throw around for the charisma skills, and all three of them are class skills, as opposed to the sorcerer's one. I think there is also a rogue talent or two to help with charisma skills as well. This is consistent with 3.5 though, so players haven't noticed any change positive or negative in this regard.

Changes to trap-finding have been well received, by both the characters that like to play rogues and the ones who don't. The game design of requiring a specific (and not very common, only 1 of the 11 core classes has it) class feature to detect the vast majority of traps is a terrible one, in my opinion. The change doesn't impact their ability to stop traps (in fact, it improves their detection), so it doesn't really bother anyone. It also makes them more free to substitute it via archetypes, instead of worrying that they'll screw the party over.


Maybe they never played 3E and don't actually realize things did not use to be this way. It's still affecting them, even outside of optimization stuff, just attempting to do the things the class fluff says they're supposed to do.

No, most of them played 3.5, and like me, they're very happy with the changes to rogue. Again, if you mostly only have experience with one type of playstyle, it can be hard to wrap your head around it, but there definitely is an improvement for many players. Not for everyone of course, but the changes have definitely had a positive impact on many players; otherwise there probably wouldn't be anyone bothering to defend Pathfinder.

[lord_khaine]

Im not going to comment on the other parts, because thats subjective stuff that i dont really have a solid oppinion on myself.


The tumble nerf isn't a huge deal, though I agree the numbers are off for it. Usually, though, it hasn't been too difficult for players to move around to flank a target in a way that doesn't provoke AoOs. Sometimes they'll also just take one attack without SA, but be in a position to full attack next round. And again, back in 3.5, this didn't even matter half the time, as players would often find themselves against undead or constructs or another one of the many enemies immune to sneak attacks.

But here i will just add that its stupidly easy for a rogue to sneak attack both golems and undeads in 3.5
All it takes is a minor wand investment (gravestrike/golemstrike), as well as points in the use magic device skill.

[VeisuItaTyhjyys]

I think, really, the debate about whether the Rogue was buffed or nerfed comes down to different ways of looking at the same exact thing. Compared to the 3.5 rogue, the Pathfinder rogue is arguably more powerful. Compared to all the other Pathfinder classes, the Pathfinder rogue is almost inarguably weaker than than 3.5 rogue was compared to the other 3.5 classes. Most of the arguments against the rogue being nerfed have amounted to "But it's easier to fill in the tax skills" and other such arguments that Pathfinder rogues are more powerful in comparison to 3.5 rogues. This is at least defensible (although I don't agree, given what's happened to tumble), but it ignores the fact that every other class got the same buff that rogue's did, while having more skill points became less useful because the truly essential skills were consolidated. So a Pathfinder rogue will be more competent than a 3.5 rogue was, but a Pathfinder party has less use for a rogue than a 3.5 party would.


Grease is actually buffed (10x the duration) for anyone who isn't a rogue.
I feel like this sentence pretty much represents Pathfinder.


Fixing some spells doesn't really matter if other spells (and ones they add later on!) are still broken. As long as a caster has win spells at each level, the number of choices doesn't really matter that much. Hell, Dazing Spell feat alone gave casters the ability to turn any damage spell into a win spell and choose what save to attack!
"Gee, guys. It's like some wizard spells aren't save-or-lose, y'know, and that's terrible. Is there something we can do to fix this grievous oversight?"


The synthesis is the least powerful archetype of summoner

I think the real hate for the Synthesist doesn't come from how powerful it is so much as from the fact that it's basically impossible not to completely break low-level play and/or wholly negate mundanes as a Synthesist; unless DM fiat gives random enemies scrolls of Dismissal, you have a guy who is blatantly better than the actual martial classes offensively and defensively, and has pretty decent casting on top of that. All his saves are good, he has evasion, and if the enemies manage to knock off his armor, he can still spam "summon monster" until the problem is solved. Sure, a Synthesist isn't Schrödinger's Wizard, but in practice, a wizard can self-regulate in ways a Synthesist really can't; I can pick spells that don't steal niches from my party, but I can't not get 1.75 HD/level, new physical stats, whatever my evolution points give me, &c.
While Pathfinder's failures at fixing balance might be disappointing, if only because of the grandiloquent claims made about "fixing" 3.5, the classes Paizo adds which ignore their own mechanics entirely are Pathfinder's most infuriating component.

[Reverent-One]

I think, really, the debate about whether the Rogue was buffed or nerfed comes down to different ways of looking at the same exact thing. Compared to the 3.5 rogue, the Pathfinder rogue is arguably more powerful. Compared to all the other Pathfinder classes, the Pathfinder rogue is almost inarguably weaker than than 3.5 rogue was compared to the other 3.5 classes. Most of the arguments against the rogue being nerfed have amounted to "But it's easier to fill in the tax skills" and other such arguments that Pathfinder rogues are more powerful in comparison to 3.5 rogues. This is at least defensible (although I don't agree, given what's happened to tumble), but it ignores the fact that every other class got the same buff that rogue's did, while having more skill points became less useful because the truly essential skills were consolidated. So a Pathfinder rogue will be more competent than a 3.5 rogue was, but a Pathfinder party has less use for a rogue than a 3.5 party would.

Given that I've wished I've had more skill points with basically every pathfinder character I've ever had, I can't agree. Other classes make suck less at skills, including potentially some stereotypical rogue skills, but the expertise and breadth of capabilities a rogue has still comes in handy.